University  of  California  •  Berkeley 

JACK  FLEMING  PRISON  COLLECTION 


2^ 


X 


PERSONAL    MEMOIR 


DANIEL   DRAYTON, 


FOR  FOUR  VEARS  AND  FOUR  MONTHS 


A  PRISONER  (FOR  CHARITY'S  SAKE)  IN  WASHINGTON  JAIL 


INCLUDING   A    NARRATIVE    OF   THE 


VOYAGE  AND  CAPTURE  OF  THE  SCHOONER  PEARL. 


We  hold  these  truths  to  be  self-evident:  that  all  men  are  created  equal; 
that  they  are  endowed  by  their  Creator  with  certain  unalienable  rights ; 
that  among  these  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness. 

DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE. 


BOSTON: 
PUBLISHED  BY  BELA  MARSH,  25  CORNHILL. 

NEW  YORK :  AMERICAN  AND  FOREIGN  ANTI-SLAVERY  SOCIETY 
1853. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1853,  by 

DANIEL  DRAYTON, 
In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts. 


STEREOTYPED   BT 

HOBAET   &    BOBBINS, 

HK\V  ENGLAND  T~YPE  AND  STEREOTYPE   FOUNDHRY, 
BOSTON. 


ADVERTISEMENT. 


CONSIDERING  the  large  share  of  the  public  attention  which  the 
case  of  the  schooner  Pearl  attracted  at  the  time  of  its  occurrence, 
perhaps  the  following  narrative  of  its  origin,  and  of  its  conse 
quences  to  himself,  by  the  principal  actor  in  it,  may  not  be  with 
out  interest.  It  is  proper  to  state  that  a  large  share  of  the 
profits  of  the  sale  are  secured  to  Captain  Drayton,  the  state  of 
whose  health  incapacitates  him  from  any  laborious  employment. 


MEMOIE. 


I  WAS  born  in  the  year  1802,  in  Cumberland 
County,  Downs  Township,  in  the  State  of  New  Jei- 
sey,  on  the  shores  of  Nantuxet  Creek,  not  far  from 
Delaware  Bay,  into  which  that  creek  flows.  My 
father  was  a  farmer, —  not  a  very  profitable  occupa 
tion  in  that  barren  part  of  the  country.  My  mother 
was  a  widow  at  the  time  of  her  marriage  with  my 
father,  having  three  children  by  a  former  husband. 
By  my  father  she  had  six  more,  of  whom  I  was  the 
youngest  but  one.  She  was  a  woman  of  strong  mind 
and  marked  character,  a  zealous  member  of  the  Meth 
odist  church ;  and,  although  I  had  the  misfortune 
to  lose  her  at  an  early  age,  her  instructions  —  though 
the  effect  was  not  apparent  at  the  moment  —  made  a 
deep  impression  on  my  youthful  mind,  and  no  doubt 
had  a  very  sensible  influence  over  my  future  life. 

Just  previous  to,  or  during  the  war  with  Great 
Britain,  my  father  removed  still  nearer  to  the  shore 
of  the  bay,  and  the  sight  of  the  vessels  passing  up 
and  down  inspired  me  with  a  desire  to  follow  the  life 
of  a  waterman ;  but  it  was  some  years  before  I  was 
able  to  gratify  this  wish.  I  well  remember  the  alarm 
created  in  our  neighborhood  by  the  incursions  of  the 
British  vessels  up  the  bay  during  the  war,  and  that, 


6  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

at  these  times,  the  women  of  the  neighborhood  used 
to  collect  at  our  house,  as  if  looking  up  to  my  mother 
for  counsel  and  guidance. 

I  was  only  twelve  years  old  when  this  good 
mother  died ;  but,  so  strong  was  the  impression  which 
she  left  upon  my  memory,  that,  amid  the  struggles 
and  dangers  and  cares  of  my  subsequent  life,  I  have 
seldom  closed  my  eyes  to  sleep  without  some  thought 
or  image  of  her. 

As  my  father  soon  after  married  another  widow, 
with  four  small  children,  it  became  necessary  to 
make  room  in  the  house  for  their  accommodation  ; 
and,  with  a  younger  brother  of  mine,  I  was  bound  out 
an  apprentice  in  a  cotton  and  woollen  factory  at  a 
place  called  Cedarville.  Manufactures  were  just  then 
beginning  to  be  introduced  into  the  country,  and 
great  hopes  were  entertained  of  them  as  a  profitable 
business.  My  employer, —  or  bos,  as  we  called  him, 
—  had  formerly  been  a  schoolmaster,  and  he  did  not 
wholly  neglect  our  instructions  in  other  things  be 
sides  cotton-spinning.  Of  this  I  stood  greatly  in  need ; 
for  there  were  no  public  schools  in  the  neighbor 
hood  in  which  I  was  born,  and  my  parents  had  too 
many  children  to  feed  and  clothe  to  be  able  to  pay 
much  for  schooling.  We  were  required  on  Sundays, 
by  our  employer,  to  learn  two  lessons,  one  in  the 
forenoon,  the  other  in  the  afternoon;  after  reciting 
which  we  were  left  at  liberty  to  roam  at  our  pleas 
ure.  Winter  evenings  we  worked  in  the  factory  till 
nine  o'clock,  after  which,  and  before  going  to  bed, 
we  were  required  to  recite  over  one  of  our  lessons 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  7 

/These  advantages  of  education  were  not  great,  but 
even  these  I  soon  lost.  Within  five  months  from  the 
time  I  was  bound  to  him,  my  employer  died.  The 
factories  were  then  sold  out  to  three  partners.  The 
one  who  carried  on  the  cotton-spinning  took  me ;  but 
he  soon  gave  up  the  business,  and  went  back  to  farm 
ing,  which  had  been  his  original  occupation.  I  re 
mained  with  him  for  a  year  and  a  half,  or  there 
abouts,  when  my  father  bound  me  out  apprentice  to 
a  shoe-maker. 

My  new  bos  was,  in  some  respects,  a  remarkable 
man,  but  not  a  very  good  sort  of  one  for  a  boy  to 
be  bound  apprentice  to.  He  paid  very  little  atten 
tion  to  his  business,  which  he  seemed  to  think  un 
worthy  of  his  genius.  He  was  a  kind-hearted  man, 
fond  of  company  and  frolics,  in  which  he  indulged 
himself  freely,  and  much  given  to  speeches  and  ha 
rangues,  in  which  he  had  a  good  deal  of  fluency.  Iiv 
religion  he  professed  to  be  a  Universalist,  holding 
to  doctrines  and  opinions  very  different  from  those- 
which  my  mother  had  instilled  into  me.  He  ridi 
culed  those  opinions,  and  argued  against  them,  but 
without  converting  me  to  his  way  of  thinking; 
though,  as  far  as  practice  went,  I  was  ready  enough 
to  imitate  his  example.  My  Sundays  were  spent 
principally  in  taverns,  playing  at  dominos,  which 
then  was,  and  still  is,  a  favorite  game  in  that  part  of 
the  country ;  and,  as  the  unsuccessful  party  was  ex 
pected  to  treat,  I  at  times  ran  up  a  bill  at  the  bar  as 
high  as  four  or  six  dollars, — no  small  indebtedness  for 
a  young  apprentice  with  no  more  means  than  I  had. 


8  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

As  I  grew  older  this  method  of  living  grew  less* 
and  less  satisfactory  to  me ;  and  as  I  saw  that  no 
good  of  any  kind,  not  even  a  knowledge  of  the  trade 
he  had  undertaken  to  teach  me,  was  to  be  got  of 
my  present  bos,  I  bought  my  time  of  him,  and  went 
to  work  with  another  man  to  pay  for  it.  Before  I  had 
succeeded  in  doing  that,  and  while  I  was  not  yet 
nineteen,  I  took  upon  myself  the  still  further  respon 
sibility  of  marriage.  This  was  a  step  into  which  I 
was  led  rather  by  the  impulse  of  youthful  passion 
than  by  any  thoughtful  foresight.  Yet  it  had  at 
least  this  advantage,  that  it  obliged  me  to  set  dili 
gently  to  work  to  provide  for  the  increasing  family 
which  I  soon  found  growing  up  around  me. 

I  had  never  liked  the  shoe-making  business,  to 
which  my  father  had  bound  me  an  apprentice.  I 
had  always  desired  to  follow  the  water.  The  ves 
sels  which  I  had  seen  sailing  up  and  down  the  Del 
aware  Bay  still  haunted  my  fancy ;  and  I  engaged 
myself  as  cook  on  board  a  sloop,  employed  in  carry 
ing  wood  from  Maurice  river  to  Philadelphia.  Pro 
motion  in  this  line  is  sufficiently  rapid ;  for  in  four 
months,  after  commencing  as  cook,  I  rose  to  be  cap 
tain.  This  wood  business,  in  which  I  remained  for 
two  years,  is  carried  on  by  vessels  of  from  thirty  to 
sixty  tons,  known  as  bay-craft.  They  are  built  so 
as  to  draw  but  little  water,  which  is  their  chief  dis 
tinction  from  the  coasters,  which  are  fit  for  the  open 
sea.  They  will  carry  from  twenty-five  to  fifty  cords 
of  wood,  on  which  a  profit  is  expected  of  a  dollar 
and  upwards.  They  have  usually  about  three 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  9 

hands,  the  captain,  or  skipper,  included.  The  men 
used  to  be  hired,  when  I  entered  the  business,  for 
eight  or  ten  dollars  the  month,  but  they  now  get 
nearly  or  quite  twice  as  much.  The  captain  usually 
sails  the  vessel  on  shares  (unless  he  is  himself  owner 
in  whole,  or  in  part),  victualling  the  vessel  and  hiring 
the  men,  and  paying  over  to  the  owner  forty  dollars 
out  of  every  hundred.  During  the  winter,  from  De 
cember  to  March,  the  navigation  is  impeded  by  ice, 
and  the  bay-craft  seldom  run.  The  men  commonly 
spend  this  long  vacation  in  visiting,  husking-frolics, 
rabbiting,  and  too  often  in  taverns,  to  the  exhaustion 
Df  their  purses,  the  impoverishment  of  their  families, 
and  the  sacrifice  of  their  sobriety.  Yet  the  water 
men,  if  many  of  them  are  not  able  always  to  resist 
the  temptations  held  out  to  them,  are  in  general  an 
nonest  and  simple-hearted  set,  though  with  little 
education,  and  sometimes  rather  rough  in  their  man 
ners.  The  extent  of  my  education  when  I  took  to 
the  water  —  and  in  this  respect  I  was  not,  perhaps, 
much  inferior  to  the  generality  of  my  brother  water 
men  —  was  to  read  with  no  great  fluency,  and  to 
sign  my  name ;  nor  did  I  ever  learn  much  more 
than  this  till  my  residence  in  Washington  jail,  to  be 
related  hereafter. 

Having  followed  the  wood  business  for  two  years, 
I  aspired  to  something  a  little  higher,  and  obtained 
the  command  of  a  sloop  engaged  in  the  coasting 
business,  from  Philadelphia  southward  and  east 
ward.  At  this  time  a  sloop  of  sixty  tons  was  con 
sidered  a  very  respectable  coaster.  The  business  is 


10  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

now  mostly  carried  on  by  vessels  of  a  larger  class  : 
some  of  them,  especially  the  regular  lines  of  packets, 
being  very  handsome  and  expensive.  The  terms  on 
which  these  coasters  were  sailed  were  very  similar 
to  those  already  stated  in  the  case  of  the  bay-craft. 
The  captain  victualled  the  vessel,  and  paid  the 
hands,  and  received  for  his  share  half  the  net  profits, 
after  deducting  the  extra  expenses  of  loading  and  un 
loading.  It  was  in  this  coasting  business  that  the 
best  years  of  my  life  were  spent,  during  which  time 
I  visited  most  of  the  ports  and  rivers  between  Sa 
vannah  southward,  and  St.  John,  in  the  British  prov 
ince  of  New  Brunswick,  eastward; — those  two  places 
forming  the  extreme  limits  of  my  voyagings.  As 
Philadelphia  was  the  port  from  and  to  which  I 
sailed,  I  presently  found  it  convenient  to  remove  my 
family  thither,  and  there  they  continued  to  live  till 
after  my  release  from  the  Washington  prison. 

I  was  so  successful  in  my  new  business,  that,  be 
sides  supporting  my  family,  I  was  able  to  become 
half  owner  of  the  sloop  Superior,  at  an  expense  of 
over  a  thousand  dollars,  most  of  which  I  paid  down. 
But  this  proved  a  very  unfortunate  investment.  On 
her  second  trip  after  I  had  bought  into  her,  returning 
from  Baltimore  to  Philadelphia  by  the  way  of  the 
Delaware  and  Chesapeake  canal,  while  off  the  mouth 
of  the  Susquehannah,  she  struck,  as  I  suppose,  a 
sunken  tree,  brought  down  by  a  heavy  freshet  in 
that  river.  The  water  flowed  fast  into  the  cabin. 
It  was  in  vain  that  I  attempted  to  run  her  ashore. 
She  sunk  in  five  minutes.  The  men  saved  them- 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  11 

selves  in  the  boat,  which  was  on  deck,  and  which 
floated  as  she  went  down.  I  stood  by  the  rudder 
till  the  last,  and  stepped  off  it  into  the  boat,  loath 
enough  to  leave  my  vessel,  on  which  there  was  no 
insurance. 

By  this  unfortunate  accident  I  lost  everything  ex 
cept  the  clothes  I  had  on,  and  was  obliged  to  com 
mence  anew.  I  accordingly  obtained  the  command  of 
the  new  sloop  Sarah  Henry,  of  seventy  tons  burden, 
and  continued  to  sail  her  for  several  years,  on  shares. 
While  in  her  I  made  a  voyage  to  Savannah ;  and 
while  under  sail  from  that  city  for  Charleston,  I  was 
taken  with  the  yellow  fever.  I  lay  for  a  week  quite 
unconscious  of  anything  that  was  going  on  about  me 
arid  came  as  near  dying  as  a  man  could  do  and  es 
cape.  The  religious  instructions  of  my  mother  had 
from  time  to  time  recurred  to  my  mind,  and  had  occa 
sioned  me  some  anxiety.  I  was  now  greatly  alarmed 
at  the  idea  of  dying  in  my  sins,  from  which  I  seemed 
to  have  escaped  so  narrowly.  My  mind  was  pos 
sessed  with  this  fear ;  and,  to  relieve  myself  from 
it,  I  determined,  if  it  were  a  possible  thing,  to  get 
religion  at  any  rate.  The  idea  of  religion  in  which 
I  had  been  educated  was  that  of  a  sudden,  miracu 
lous  change,  in  which  a  man  felt  himself  relieved 
from  the  burden  of  his  sins,  united  to  God,  and 
made  a  new  creature.  For  this  experience  I  dili 
gently  sought,  and  tried  every  way  to  get  it.  I  set 
up  family  prayers  in  my  house,  went  to  meetings,  and 
conversed  with  experienced  members  of  the  church  ; 
but,  for  nine  months  or  more,  all  to  no  purpose.  At 


12  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

length  I  got  into  an  awful  state,  beginning  to  think 
that  I  had  been  so  desperate  a  sinner  that  there  was 
no  forgiveness  for  me.  While  I  was  in  this  miser 
able  condition,  I  heard  of  a  camp-meeting  about  to 
be  held  on  Cape  May,  and  I  immediately  resolved 
to  attend  it,  and  to  leave  no  stone  unturned  to  accom 
plish  the  object  which  I  had  so  much  at  heart.  I  went 
accordingly,  and  yielded  myself  entirely  up  to  the  dic 
tation  of  those  who  had  the  control  of  the  meeting.  I 
did  in  everything  as  I  was  told ;  went  into  the  altar, 
prayed,  and  let  them  pray  over  me.  This  went  on  for 
several  days  without  any  result.  One  evening,  as  I 
approached  the  altar,  and  was  looking  into  it,  I  met  a 
captain  of  my  acquaintance,  and  asked  him  what  he 
thought  of  these  proceedings  ;  and,  as  he  seemed  to 
approve  them,  I  invited  him  to  go  into  the  altar  with 
me.  We  both  went  in  accordingly,  and  knelt  down. 
Pretty  soon  my  friend  got  up  and  walked  away,  say 
ing  he  had  got  religion.  I  did  not  find  it  so  easily. 
I  remained  at  the  altar,  praying,  till  after  the  meet 
ing  broke  up,  and  even  till  one  o'clock, —  a  few 
acquaintances  and  others  remaining  with  me,  and 
praying  round  me,  and  over  me,  and  for  me ;  —  till, 
at  last,  thinking  that  I  had  done  everything  I 
could,  I  told  them  pray  no  more,  as  evidently  there 
was  no  forgiveness  for  me.  So  I  withdrew  to  a  dis 
tance,  and  sat  down  upon  an  old  tree,  lamenting  my 
hard  case  very  seriously.  I  was  sure  I  had  committed 
the  unpardonable  sin.  A  friend,  who  sat  down 
beside  me,  and  of  whom  I  inquired  what  he  sup 
posed  the  unpardonable  sin  was,  endeavored  to  com- 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  13 

fort  me  by  suggesting  that,  whatever  it  might  be,  it 
would  take  more  sense  and  learning  than  ever  I  had 
to  commit  it.  But  I  would  not  enter  into  his  merri 
ment.  All  the  next  day,  which  was  Sunday,  I 
passed  in  a  most  miserable  state.  I  went  into  the 
woods  alone.  I  did  not  think  myself  worthy  or  fit 
to  associate  with  those  who  had  religion,  while  I  was 
anxious  to  avoid  the  company  of  those  who  made 
light  of  it.  Sometimes  I  would  sit  down,  sometimes 
I  would  stand  up,  sometimes  I  would  walk  about. 
Frequently  I  prayed,  but  found  no  comfort  in  it. 

About  sun-set  I  met  a  friend,  who  said  to  me, 
"  Well,  our  camp-meeting  is  about  ended.'7  What  a 
misery  those  few  words  struck  to  my  heart !  " About 
ended!"  I  said  to  myself;  "  about  ended,  and 
I  not  converted  !  "  A  little  later,  as  I  was  passing 
along  the  camp-ground,  I  saw  a  woman  before  me 
kneeling  and  praying.  An  acquaintance  of  mine,  who 
was  approaching  her  in  an  opposite  direction,  called 
out  to  me,  "  Daniel,  help  me  pray  for  this  woman  !" 
I  had  made  up  my  mind  to  make  one  more  effort, 
and  I  knelt  down  and  commenced  praying ;  but  quite 
as  much  for  myself  as  for  her.  Others  gathered 
about  us  and  joined  in,  and  the  interest  and  excite 
ment  became  so  great,  that,  after  a  vain  effort  to  call 
us  off,  the  regular  services  of  the  evening  were  dis 
pensed  with,  and  the  ground  was  left  to  us.  Things 
went  on  in  this  way  till  about  nine  o'clock,  when,  as 
suddenly  as  if  I  had  been  struck  a  heavy  blow,  I  felt 
a  remarkable  change  come  over  me.  All  my  fears 
and  terrors  seemed  to  be  instantaneously  removed, 
2 


14  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

and  my  whole  soul  to  be  filled  with  joy  and  peace. 
This  was  the  sort  of  change  which  I  had  been 
taught  to  look  for  as  the  consequence  of  getting  that 
religion  for  which  I  had  been  struggling  so  hard.  I 
instantly  rose  up,  and  told  those  about  me  that  I  was 
a  converted  man ;  and  from  that  moment  I  was  able 
to  sing  and  shout  and  pray  with  the  best  of  them. 
In  the  midst  of  my  exultation  who  should  come 
up  but  my  old  master  in  the  shoe-making  trade,  of 
whom  I  have  already  given  some  account.  He  had 
heard  that  I  was  on  the  camp-ground  in  pursuit  of 
religion,  and  had  come  to  find  me  out.  "  Daniel," 
he  said,  addressing  me  by  my  Christian  name, 
"  what  are  you  doing  here  ?  Don't  make  a  fool  of 
yourself."  To  which  I  answered,  that  I  had  got  to 
be  just  such  a  fool  as  I  had  long  wanted  to  be ; 
and  I  took  him  by  the  arm,  and  endeavored  to  pre 
vail  upon  him  to  kneel  down  and  allow  us  to  pray 
over  him,  assuring  him  that  I  knew  his  convictions 
to  be  much  better  than  his  conduct ;  that  he  must 
get  religion,  and  now  was  the  time.  But  he  drew 
back,  and  escaped  from  me,  with  promises  to  do  bet 
ter,  which,  however,  he  did  not  keep. 

As  for  myself,  considering,  and,  as  I  thought,  feel 
ing  that  I  was  a  converted  man,  I  now  enjoyed  for 
some  time  an  extraordinary  satisfaction,  a  sort  of 
offset  to  the  months  of  agony  and  misery  which  I  had 
previously  endured.  But,  though  regarding  myself 
as  now  truly  converted,  I  delayed  some  time  before 
uniting  myself  with  any  particular  church.  I  did 
not  know  which  to  join.  This  division  into  so  many 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  15 

hostile  sects  seemed  to  me  unaccountable.  I  thought 
that  all  good  Christians  should  love  each  other,  and 
be  as  one  family.  Yet  it  seemed  necessary  to  unite 
myself  with  some  body  of  Christians ;  and,  as  I  had 
been  educated  a  Methodist,  I  concluded  to  join  them. 

I  have  given  the  account  of  my  religious  expe 
rience  exactly  as  it  seemed  to  me  at  the  time,  and 
as  I  now  remember  it.  It  corresponded  with  the  com 
mon  course  of  religious  experiences  in  the  Methodist 
church,  except  that  with  me  the  struggle  was  harder 
than  commonly  happens.  I  did  not  doubt  at  the 
time  that  it  was  truly  a  supernatural  change,  as 
much  the  work  of  the  Spirit  as  the  sudden  conver 
sions  recorded  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles.  Others 
can  form  their  own  opinion  about  it.  I  will  only  add 
that  subsequent  experience  has  led  me  to  the  belief 
that  the  reality  of  a  man's  religion  is  more  to  be 
judged  of  by  what  he  does  than  by  how  he  feels  or 
what  he  says. 

The  change  which  had  taken  place  in  me,  how 
ever  it  is  to  be  regarded,  was  not  without  a  decided 
influence  on  my  whole  future  life.  I  no  longer  con 
sidered  my  self  as  living  for  myself  alone.  I  regarded 
myself  as  bound  to  do  unto  others  as  I  would  that 
they  should  do  unto  me ;  and  it  was  in  attempting  to 
act  up  to  this  principle  that  I  became  involved  in  the 
difficulties  to  be  hereafter  related. 

Meanwhile  I  resumed  my  voyages  in  the  Sarah 
Henry,  in  which  I  continued  to  sail,  on  shares,  for  sev 
eral  years,  with  tolerable  success.  Afterwards  I  fol 
lowed  the  same  business  in  the  schooner  Protection, 


16  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

in  which  I  suffered  another  shipwreck.  We  sailed 
from  Philadelphia  to  Washington,  in  the  District  of 
Columbia,  laden  with  coal,  proceeding  down  the  Del 
aware,  and  by  the  open  sea ;  but,  when  off  the 
entrance  of  the  Chesapeake,  we  encountered  a  heavy 
gale,  which  split  the  sails,  swept  the  decks,  and  drove 
us  off  our  course  as  far  south  as  Ocracoke  Inlet,  on 
the  coast  of  North  Carolina.  I  took  a  pilot,  intending 
to  go  in  to  repair  damages ;  but,  owing  to  the  strength 
of  the  current,  which  defeated  his  calculations,  the 
pilot  ran  us  on  the  bar.  As  soon  as  the  schooner's 
bow  touched  the  ground,  she  swung  round  broadside 
to  the  sea,  which  immediately  began  to  break  over 
her  in  a  fearful  manner.  She  filled  immediately, — 
iverything  on  deck  was  swept  away;  and,  as  our 
only  chance  of  safety,  we  took  to  the  main-rigging 
This  was  about  seven  o'clock  in  the  evening.  To 
wards  morning,  by  reason  of  the  continual  thumping; 
the  mainmast  began  to  work  through  the  vessel,  and 
to  settle  in  the  sand,  so  that  it  became  necessary  for 
us  to  make  our  way  to  the  fore-rigging ;  which  we 
did,  not  without  danger,  as  one  of  the  men  was 
twice  washed  off. 

About  a  quarter  of  a  mile  inside  was  a  small,  low 
island,  on  which  lay  five  boats,  each  manned  by  five 
%men,  who  had  come  down  to  our  assistance  ;  but  the 
surf  was  so  high  that  they  did  not  venture  to  ap 
proach  us ;  so  we  remained  clinging  with  difficulty 
to  the  rigging  till  about  half-past  one,  when  the 
schooner  went  to  pieces.  The  mast  to  which  we 
were  clinging  fell,  and  we  were  precipitated  into  the 


OP    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  17 

raging  surf,  which  swept  us  onward  towards  the 
island  already  mentioned.  The  men  there,  anticipat 
ing  what  had  happened,  had  prepared  for  its  occur 
rence  ;  and  the  best  swimmers,  with  ropes  tied  round 
their  waists,  the  other  end  of  which  was  held  by 
those  on  shore,  plunged  in  to  our  assistance.  One 
of  our  unfortunate  company  was  drowned, —  the  rest 
of  us  came  safely  to  the  shore ;  but  we  lost  every 
thing  except  the  clothes  we  stood  in.  The  frag 
ments  saved  from  the  wreck  were  sold  at  auction  for 
two  hundred  dollars.  The  people  of  that  neighbor 
hood  treated  us  with  great  kindness,  and  we  pres 
ently  took  the  packet  for  Elizabeth  city,  whence  I 
proceeded  to  Norfolk,  Baltimore,  and  so  home. 

I  had  made  up  my  mind  to  go  to  sea  no  more ;  but, 
after  remaining  on  shore  for  three  weeks,  and  riot 
finding  anything  else  to  do,  as  it  was  necessary  for 
me  to  have  the  means  of  supporting  my  increasing 
family,  I  took  the  command  of  another  vessel,  be 
longing  to  the  same  owners,  the  sloop  Joseph  B. 
While  in  this  vessel,  my  voyages  were  to  the  east 
ward.  I  was  engaged  in  the  flour-trade,  in  conjunc 
tion  with  the  owners  of  the  vessel.  We  bought 
flour  and  grain  on  a  sixty  days'  credit,  which  I  car 
ried  to  the  Kennebec,  Portsmouth,  Boston,  New  Bed 
ford,  and  other  eastern  ports,  calculating  upon  the 
returns  of  the  voyage  to  take  up  our  notes.  I  was 
so  successful  in  this  business  as  finally  to  become  the 
owner  of  the  Joseph  B.,  which  vessel  I  exchanged 
away  at  Portsmouth  for  the  Sophronia,  a  top-sail 
schooner  of  one  hundred  and  sixty  tons,  worth  about 


18  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

fourteen  hundred  dollars.  In  this  vessel  1  made  two 
trips  to  Boston, —  one  with  coal,  and  the  other  with 
timber.  Having  unloaded  my  timber,  I  took  in  a 
hundred  tons  of  plaster,  purchased  on  my  own  ac 
count,  intending  to  dispose  of  it  in  the  Susque- 
hanna.  But  on  the  passage  I  encountered  a  heavy 
storm,  which  blew  the  masts  out  of  the  vessel,  and 
drove  her  ashore  on  the  south  side  of  Long  Island. 
We  saved  our  lives  ;  but  I  lost  everything  except  one 
hundred  and  sixty  dollars,  for  which  I  sold  what  was 
left  of  the  vessel  and  cargo. 

Having  returned  to  my  family,  with  but  little  dis 
position  to  try  my  fortune  again  in  the  coasting-trade, 
one  day,  being  in  the  horse-market,  I  purchased  a 
horse  and  wagon ;  and,  taking  in  my  wife  and  some 
of  the  younger  children,  I  went  to  pay  a  visit  to  the 
neighborhood  in  which  I  was  born.  Here  I  traded  for 
half  of  a  bay-craft,  of  about  sixty  tons  burden,  in 
which  I  engaged  in  the  oyster-trade,  and  other  small 
bay-traffic.  Having  met  at  Baltimore  the  owner  of 
the  other  half,  I  bought  him  out  also.  The  whole 
craft  stood  me  in  about  seven  hundred  dollars.  I  then 
purchased  three  hundred  bushels  of  potatoes,  with 
which  I  sailed  for  Fredericksburg,  in  Virginia;  but  this 
proved  a  losing  trip,  the  potatoes  not  selling  for  what 
they  cost  me.  At  Fredericksburg  I  took  in  flour  on 
freight  for  Norfolk;  but  my  ill-luck  still  pursued  me. 
In  unloading  the  vessel,  the  cargo  forward  being  first 
taken  out,  she  settled  by  the  stern  and  sprang  aleak, 
damaging  fifteen  barrels  of  flour,  which  were  thrown 
upon  my  hands.  I  then  sailed  for  the  eastern  shore 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  19 

of  Virginia,  and  at  a  place  called  Cherrystone  traded 
off  my  damaged  flour  for  a  cargo  of  pears,  with 
which  I  sailed  for  New  York.  I  proceeded  safely  as 
far  as  Barnegat,  when  I  encountered  a  north-east 
storm,  which  drove  me  back  into  the  Delaware, 
obliging  me  to  seek  refuge  in  the  same  Maurice  river 
from  which  I  had  commenced  my  sea-faring  life  in 
the  wood  business.  But  by  this  time  the  pears  were 
spoiled,  and  I  was  obliged  to  throw  them  overboard. 
At  Cherrystone  I  had  met  the  owner  of  a  pilot-boat, 
who  had  seemed  disposed  to  trade  with  me  for  my 
vessel ;  and  I  now  returned  to  that  place,  and  com 
pleted  the  trade ;  after  which  I  loaded  the  pilot-boat 
with  oysters  and  terrapins,  and  sailed  for  Philadel 
phia.  This  boat  was  an  excellent  sailer,  but  too 
sharp,  and  not  of  burden  enough  for  my  business;  and 
I  soon  exchanged  her  for  half  a  little  sloop,  in  which 
I  carried  a  load  of  water-melons  to  Baltimore. 

By  this  time  I  was  pretty  well  sick  of  the  water ; 
and,  having  hired  out  the  sloop,  I  set  up  a  shop,  at 
Philadelphia,  for  the  purchase  and  sale  of  junk,  old 
iron,  &c.  &c.  But,  after  continuing  in  this  business 
for  about  two  years, — my  health  being  bad,  and  the 
doctor  having  advised  me  to  try  the  water  again, — I 
bought  half  of  another  sloop,  and  engaged  in  trading 
up  and  down  Chesapeake  Bay.  Returning  home, 
towards  the  close  of  the  season,  with  the  proceeds  of 
the  summer's  business,  I  encountered,  in  the  upper 
part  of  Chesapeake  Bay,  a  terrible  snow-storm,  which 
proved  fatal  to  many  vessels  then  in  the  bay.  In 
attempting  to  make  a  harbor,  the  vessel  struck  the 


20  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

ground,  and  knocked  off  her  rudder ;  and,  in  order  to 
get  her  off,  we  were  obliged  to  throw  over  the  deck- 
load.  We  drifted  about  all  day,  it  still  blowing  and 
snowing,  and  at  night  let  go  both  anchors.  So  we 
lay  for  a  night  and  a  day ;  but,  having  neither  boat, 
rudder  nor  provisions,  I  was  finally  obliged  to  slip  the 
anchors  and  run  ashore.  I  sold  my  half  of  her,  as  she 
lay,  for  ninety  dollars,  which  was  all  that  remained 
to  me  of  my. investment  and  my  summer's  work. 

Not  having  the  means  to  purchase  a  boat,  my 
health  also  continuing  quite  infirm,  the  next  sum 
mer  I  hired  one,  and  continued  the  same  trade  up 
and  down  the  bay  which  1  had  followed  the  pre 
vious  summer. 

My  trading  up  and  down  the  bay,  in  the  way 
which  I  have  described,  of  course  brought  me  a  good 
deal  into  contact  with  the  slave  population.  No 
sooner,  indeed,  does  a  vessel,  known  to  be  from  the 
north,  anchor  in  any  of  these  waters  —  and  the 
slaves  are  pretty  adroit  in  ascertaining  from  what 
state  a  vessel  comes  —  than  she  is  boarded,  if  she 
remains  any  length  of  time,  and  especially  over 
night,  by  more  or  less  of  them,  in  hopes  of  obtaining 
a  passage  in  her  to  a  land  of  freedom.  During  my 
earlier  voyagings,  several  years  before,  in  Chesa 
peake  Bay,  I  had  turned  a  deaf  ear  to  all  these  re 
quests.  At  that  time,  according  to  an  idea  still  com 
mon  enough,  I  had  regarded  the  negroes  as  only  fit 
to  be  slaves,  and  had  not  been  inclined  to  pay  much 
attention  to  the  pitiful  tales  which  they  told  me  of 
ill-treatment  by  their  masters  and  mistresses  But 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  21 

my  views  upon  this  subject  had  undergone  a  gradual 
change.  I  knew  it  was  asserted  in  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  that  all  men  are  born  free  and 
equal,  and  I  had  read  in  the  Bible  that  God  had  made 
of  one  flesh  all  the  nations  of  the  earth.  I  had  found 
out,  by  intercourse  with  the  negroes,  that  they  had 
the  same  desires,  wishes  and  hopes,  as  myself.  I 
knew  very  well  that  I  should  not  like  to  be  a  slave 
even  to  the  best  of  masters,  and  still  less^to  such  sort 
of  masters  as  the  greater  part  of  the  slaves  seemed  to 
have.  The  idea  of  having  first  one  child  and  then 
another  taken  from  me,  as  fast  as  they  grew  large 
enough,  and  handed  over  to  the  slave-traders,  to  be 
carried  I  knew  not  where,  and  sold,  if  they  were 
girls,  I  knew  not  for  what  purposes,  would  have 
been  horrible  enough ;  and,  from  instances  which 
came  to  my  notice,  I  perceived  that  it  was  not  less 
horrible  and  distressing  to  the  parties  concerned  in 
the  case  of  black  people  than  of  white  ones.  I 
had  never  read  any  abolition  books,  nor  heard  any 
abolition  lectures.  I  had  frequented  only  Meth 
odist  meetings,  and  nothing  was  heard  there  about 
slavery.  But,  for  the  life  of  me,  I  could  not  per 
ceive  why  the  golden  rule  of  doing  to  others  as 
you  would  wish  them  to  do  to  you  did  not  apply  to 
this  case.  Had  I  been  a  slave  myself, —  and  it^s 
not  a  great  while  since  the  Algerines  used  to 
make  slaves  of  our  sailors,  white  as  well  as  black, 
—  I  should  have  thought  it  very  right  and  proper  in 
anybody  who  would  have  ventured  to  assist  me  in 
escaping  out  of  bondage ;  and  the  more  dangerous  it 


x5«  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

might  have  been  to  render  such  assistance,  the  more 
meritorious  I  should  have  thought  the  act  to  be. 
Why  had  not  these  black  people,  so  anxious  to 
escape  from  their  masters,  as  good  a  right  to  their 
liberty  as  I  had  to  mine? 

I  know  it  is  sometimes  said,  by  those  who  defend 
slavery  or  apologize  for  it,  that  the  slaves  at  the 
south  are  very  happy  and  contented,  if  left  to  them 
selves,  and  that  this  idea  of  running  away  is  only 
put  into  their  heads  by  mischievous  white  people 
from  the  north.  This  will  do  very  well  for  those 
who  know  nothing  of  the  matter  personally,  and  who 
are  anxious  to  listen  to  any  excuse.  But  there  is 
not  a  waterman  who  ever  sailed  in  Chesapeake  Bay 
who  will  not  tell  you  that,  so  far  from  the  slaves 
needing  any  prompting  to  run  away,  the  difficulty  is, 
when  they  ask  you  to  assist  them,  to  make  them 
take  no  for  an  answer.  I  have  known  instances 
where  men  have  lain  in  the  woods  for  a  year  or  two, 
waiting  for  an  opportunity  to  escape  on  board  some 
vessel.  On  one  of  my  voyages  up  the  Potomac,  an 
application  was  made  to  me  on  behalf  of  such  a  run 
away;  and  I  was  so  much  moved  by  his  story,  that, 
had  it  been  practicable  for  me  at  that  time,  I  should 
certainly  have  helped  him  off.  One  or  two  attempts 
I  (fed  make  to  assist  the  flight  of  some  of  those  who 
sought  my  assistance;  but  none  with  success,  till  the 
summer  of  1847,  which  is  the  period  to  which  I  have 
brought  down  my  narrative. 

1  was  employed  during  that  summer,  as  I  have 
mentioned  already  in  trading  up  and  down  the 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  23 

Chesapeake,  in  a  hired  boat,  a  small  black  boy  being 
my  only  assistant.  Among  other  trips,  I  went  to 
Washington  with  a  cargo  of  oysters.  While  I  was 
lying  there,  at  the  same  wharf,  as  it  happened,  from 
which  the  Pearl  afterwards  took  her  departure,  a 
colored  man  came  on  board,  and,  observing  that  I 
seemed  to  be  from  the  north,  he  said  he  supposed  we 
were  pretty  much  all  abolitionists  there.  I  don't 
know  where  he  got  this  piece  of  information,  but  1 
think  it  likely  from  some  southern  member  of  Con 
gress.  As  I  did  not  check  him,  but  rather  encour 
aged  him  to  go  on,  he  finally  told  me  that  he  wanted 
to  get  passage  to  the  north  for  a  woman  and  five 
children.  The  husband  of  the  woman,  and  father  of 
the  children,  was  a  free  colored  man;  and  the  woman, 
under  an  agreement  with  her  master,  had  already 
more  than  paid  for  her  liberty ;  but,  when  she  had 
asked  him  for  a  settlement,  he  had  only  answered  by 
threatening  to  sell  her.  He  begged  me  to  see  the 
woman,  which  I  did ;  and  finally  I  made  an  arrange 
ment  to  take  them  away.  Their  bedding,  and  other 
things,  were  sent  down  on  board  the  vessel  in  open 
day,  and  at  night  the  woman  came  on  board  with 
her  five  children  and  a  niece.  We  were  ten  days  in 
reaching  Frenchtown,  where  the  husband  was  in 
waiting  for  them.  He  took  them  under  his  charge, 
and  I  saw  them  no  more  ;  but,  since  my  release  from 
imprisonment  in  Washington,  I  have  heard  that  the 
whole  family  are  comfortably  established  in  a  free 
country,  and  doing  well. 

Having   accomplished  this  exploit, —  and  was  it 


24  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

not  something  of  an  exploit  to  bestow  the  invaluab1 
gift  of  liberty  upon  seven  of  one's  fellow-creatures*- 

—  the  season  being  now  far  advanced,  I  gave  up  thfc 
boat  to  the  owner,  and  returned  to  my  family  a 
Philadelphia.  In  the  course  of  the  following  month 
of  February,  I  received  a  note  from  a  person  whom  I 
had  never  known  or  heard  of  before,  desiring  me  to 
call  at  a  certain  place  named  in  it.  I  did  so,  when 
it  appeared  that  I  had  been  heard  of  through  the 
colored  family  which  I  had  brought  off  from  Wash 
ington.  A  letter  from  that  city  was  read  to  me.  re 
lating  the  case  of  a  family  or  two  who  expected  daily 
and  hourly  to  be  sold,  and  desiring  assistance  to  get 
them  away.  It  was  proposed  to  me  to  undertake 
this  enterprise ;  but  I  declined  it  at  this  time,  as  I  had 
no  vessel,  and  because  the  season  was  too  early  for 
navigation  through  the  canal.  I  saw  the  same  per 
son  again  about  a  fortnight  later,  and  finally  ar 
ranged  to  go  on  to  Washington,  to  see  what  could  be 
done.  There  I  agreed  to  return  again  so  soon  as  I 
could  find  a  vessel  fit  for  the  enterprise.  I  spoke 
with  several  persons  of  my  acquaintance,  who  had 
vessels  under  their  control ;  but  they  declined,  on  ac 
count  of  the  danger.  They  did  not  appear  to  have 
any  other  objection,  and  seemed  to  wish  me  success. 
Passing  along  the  street,  I  met  Captain  Sayres,  and 
knowing  that  he  was  sailing  a  small  bay-craft,  called 
the  Pearl,  and  learning  from  him  that  business  was 
dull  with  him,  I  proposed  the  enterprise  to  him,  offer 
ing  him  one  hundred  dollars  for  the  charter  of  his 

vessel   to   Washington   and   back   to   Frenchtown, 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  25 

where,  according  to  the  arrangement  with  the  friends 
of  the  passengers,  they  were  to  be  met  and  carried 
to  Philadelphia.  This  was  considerably  more  than 
the  vessel  could  earn  in  any  ordinary  trip  of  the  like 
duration,  and  Sayres  closed  with  the  offer.  He  fully 
understood  the  nature  of  the  enterprise.  By  our 
bargain,  I  was  to  have,  as  supercargo,  the  control  of 
the  vessel  so  far  as  related  to  her  freight,  and  was 
to  bring  away  from  Washington  such  passengers  as 
I  chose  to  receive  on  board  •  but  the  control  of  the 
vessel  in  other  respects  remained  with  him.  Captain 
Sayres  engaged  in  this  enterprise  merely  as  a  matter 
of  business.  I,  too,  was  to  be  paid  for  my  time  and 
trouble, —  an  offer  which  the  low  state  of  my  pecu 
niary  affairs,  and  the  necessity  of  supporting  my  fam 
ily,  did  not  allow  me  to  decline.  But  this  was  not,  by 
any  means,  my  sole  or  principal  motive.  I  undertook 
it  out  of  sympathy  for  the  enslaved,  and  from  my  de 
sire  to  do  something  to  further  the  cause  of  universal 
liberty.  Such  being  the  different  ground  upon  which 
Sayres  and  myself  stood,  I  did  not  think  it  necessary 
or  expedient  to  communicate  to  him  the  names  of  the 
persons  with  whom  the  expedition  had  originated ; 
and,  at  my  suggestion,  those  persons  abstained  from 
any  direct  communication  with  him,  either  at  Phila 
delphia  or  Washington.  Sayres  had,  as  cook  and 
sailor,  on  board  the  Pearl,  a  young  man  named  Ches 
ter  English.  He  was  married,  and  had  a  child  or 
two,  but  was  himself  as  inexperienced  as  a  child, 
having  never  been  more  than  thirty  miles  from  the 
place  where  he  was  born.  I  remonstrated  with 
3 


26  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

Sayres  against  taking  this  young  man  with  us.  But 
English,  pleased  with  the  idea  of  seeing  Washington, 
desired  to  go ;  and  Sayres,  who  had  engaged  him  for 
the  season,  did  not  like  to  part  with  him.  He  went 
with  us,  but  was  kept  in  total  ignorance  of  the  real 
object  of  the  voyage.  He  had  the  idea  that  we  were 
going  to  Washington  for  a  load  of  ship-timber. 

We  proceeded  down  the  Delaware,  and  by  the 
canal  into  the  Chesapeake,  making  for  the  mouth  of 
the  Potomac.  As  we  ascended  that  river  we  stopped 
at  a  place  called  Machudock,  where  I  purchased,  by 
way  of  cargo  and  cover  to  the  voyage,  twenty  cords 
of  wood ;  and  with  that  freight  on  board  we  pro 
ceeded  to  Washington,  where  we  arrived  on  the 
evening  of  Thursday,  the  13th  of  April,  1848. 

As  it  happened,  we  found  that  city  in  a  great  state 
of  excitement  on  the  subject  of  emancipation,  liberty 
and  the  rights  of  man.  A  grand  torch-light  proces 
sion  was  on  foot,  in  honor  of  the  new  French  revolu 
tion,  the  expulsion  of  Louis-Philippe,  and  the  estab 
lishment  of  a  republic  in  France.  Bonfires  were 
blazing  in  the  public  squares,  and  a  great  out-door 
meeting  was  being  held  in  front  of  the  Union  news 
paper  office,  at  which  very  enthusiastic  and  exciting 
speeches  were  delivered,  principally  by  southern 
democratic  members  of  Congress,  which  body  was  at 
that  time  in  session.  A  full  account  of  these  proceed 
ings,  wifh  reports  of  the  speeches,  was  given  in  the 
Union  of  the  next  day.  According  to  this  report, 
Mr.  Foote,  the  senator  from  Mississippi,  extolled  the 
French  revolution  as  holding  out  "  to  the  whole  fam- 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  27 

ily  of  man  a  bright  promise  of  the  universal  estab 
lishment  of  civil  and  religious  liberty."  He  declared, 
in  the  same  speech,  "  that  the  age  of  tyrants  and  of 
slavery  was  rapidly  drawing  to  a  close,  and  that  the 
happy  period  to  be  signalized  by  the  universal  eman 
cipation  of  man  from  the  fetters  of  civic  oppression, 
and  the  recognition  in  all  countries  of  the  great  prin 
ciples  of  popular  sovereignty,  equality  and  brother 
hood,  was  at  this  moment  visibly  commencing." 
Mr.  Stanton,  of  Tennessee,  and  others,  spoke  in  a 
strain  equally  fervid  and  philanthropic.  I  am  obliged 
to  refer  to  the  Union  newspaper  for  an  account  of 
these  speeches,  as  I  did  not  hear  them  myself.  I 
came  to  Washington,  not  to  preach,  nor  to  hear 
preached,  emancipation,  equality  and  brotherhood, 
but  to  put  them  into  practice.  Sayres  and  English 
went  up  to  see  the  procession  and  hear  the  speeches. 
I  had  other  things  to  attend  to. 

The  news  of  my  arrival  soon  spread  among  those 
who  had  been  expecting  it,  though  I  neither  saw  nor 
had  any  direct  communication  with  any  of  those  who 
were  to  be  my  passengers.  I  had  some  difficulty  in 
disposing  of  my  wood,  which  was  not  a  very  first- 
rate  article,  but  finally  sold  it,  taking  in  payment 
the  purchaser's  note  on  sixty  days,  which  I  changed 
off  for  half  cash  and  half  provisions.  As  the  trader  to 
whom  I  passed  the  note  had  no  hard  'bread,  Sayres 
and  myself  went  in  the  steamer  to  Alexandria  to 
purchase  a  barrel, —  a  circumstance  of  which  it  was 
afterwards  attempted  to  take  advantage  against  us. 

It  was  arranged  that  the  passengers  should  come 


28  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

on  board  after  dark  on  Saturday  evening,  and  that 
we  should  sail  about  midnight.  I  had  understood 
that  the  expedition  had  principally  originated  in  the 
desire  to  help  off  a  certain  family,  consisting  of  a 
woman,  nine  children  and  two  grand-children,  who 
were  believed  to  be  legally  entitled  to  their  liberty. 
Their  case  had  been  in  litigation  for  some  time ; 
but,  although  they  had  a  very  good  case, —  the  law 
yer  whom  they  employed  (Mr.  Bradley,  one  of  the 
most  distinguished  members  of  the  bar  of  the  dis 
trict)  testified,  in  the  course  of  one  of  my  trials, 
that  he  believed  them  to  be  legally  free, —  yet,  as 
their  money  was  nearly  exhausted,  and  as  there 
seemed  to  be  no  end  to  the  law's  delay  and  the  per 
tinacity  of  the  woman  who  claimed  them,  it  was 
deemed  best  by  their  friends  that  they  should  get 
away  if  they  could,  lest  she  might  seize  them  un 
awares,  and  sell  them  to  some  trader.  In  speaking 
of  this  case,  the  person  with  whom  I  communicated 
at  Washington  informed  me  that  there  were  also 
quite  a  number  of  others  who  wished  to  avail  them 
selves  of  this  opportunity  of  escaping,  and  that  the 
number  of  passengers  was  likely  to  be  larger  than  had 
at  first  been  calculated  upon.  To  which  I  replied, 
that  I  did  not  stand  about  the  number ;  that  all 
who  were  on  board  before  eleven  o'clock  I  should 
take, —  the  others  would  have  to  remain  behind. 

Saturday  evening,  at  supper,  I  let  English  a  little 
into  the  secret  of  what  I  intended.  I  told  him  that 
the  sort  of  ship-timber  we  were  going  to  take  would 
prove  very  easy  to  load  and  unload ;  that  a  numbei 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  29 

of  colored  people  wished  to  take  passage  with  us  down 
the  bay,  and  that,  as  Sayres  and  myself  would  be 
away  the  greater  part  of  the  evening,  all  he  had  to 
do  was,  as  fast  as  they  came  on  board,  to  lift  up  the 
hatch  and  let  them  pass  into  the  hold,  shutting  the 
hatch  down  upon  them.  The  vessel,  which  we  had 
moved  down  the  river  since  unloading  the  wood,  lay 
at  a  rather  lonely  place,  called  White-house  Wharf, 
from  a  whitish-colored  building  which  stood  upon 
it.  The  high  bank  of  the  river,  under  which  a  road 
passed,  aiforded  a  cover  to  the  wharf,  and  there  were 
only  a  few  scattered  buildings  in  the  vicinity.  Tow 
ards  the  town  there  stretched  a  wide  extent  of  open 
fields.  Anxious,  as  might  naturally  be  expected,  as 
to  the  result,  I  kept  in  the  vicinity  to  watch  the 
progress  of  events.  There  was  another  small  vessel 
that  lay  across  the  head  of  the  same  wharf,  but  her 
crew  were  all  black ;  and,  going  on  board  her  just  at 
dusk,  I  informed  the  skipper  of  my  business,  intimat 
ing  to  him,  at  the  same  time,  that  it  would  be  a 
dangerous  thing  for  him  to  betray  me.  He  assured 
me  that  I  need  have  no  fears  of  him  —  that  the  other 
men  would  soon  leave  the  vessel,  not  to  return  again 
till  Monday,  and  that,  for  himself,  he  should  go 
below  and  to  sleep,  so  as  neither  to  hear  nor  to  see 
anything. 

Shortly  after  dark  the  expected  passengers  began 
to  arrive,  coming  stealthily  across  the  fields,  and 
gliding  silently  on  board  the  vessel.  I  observed  a 
man  near  a  neighboring  brick-kiln,  who  seemed  to 
be  watching  them.  I  went  towards  him,  and  found 
3* 


30  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

him  to  be  black.  He  told  me  that  he  understood 
what  was  going  on,  but  that  I  need  have  no  appre 
hension  of  him.  Two  white  men,  who  walked  along 
the  road  past  the  vessel,  and  who  presently  returned 
back  the  same  way,  occasioned  me  some  alarm ;  but 
they  seemed  to  have  no  suspicions  of  what  was  on 
foot,  as  I  saw  no  more  of  them.  I  went  on  board 
the  vessel  several  times  in  the  course  of  the  evening, 
and  learned  from  English  that  the  hold  was  fast  fill 
ing  up.  I  had  promised  him,  in  consideration  of  the 
unusual  nature  of  the  business  we  were  engaged  in, 
ten  dollars  as  a  gratuity,  in  addition  to  his  wages. 

Something  past  ten  o'clock,  I  went  on  board,  and 
directed  English  to  cast  off  the  fastenings  and  to  get 
ready  to  make  sail.  Pretty  soon  Sayres  came  on 
board.  It  was  a  dead  calm,  and  we  were  obliged  to 
get  the  boat  out  to  get  the  vessel's  head  round. 
After  dropping  down  a  half  a  mile  or  so,  we  encoun 
tered  the  tide  making  up  the  river ;  and,  as  there 
was  still  no  wind,  we  were  obliged  to  anchor.  Here 
we  lay  in  a  dead  calm  till  about  daylight.  The 
wind  then  began  to  breeze  up  lightly  from  the  north 
ward,  when  we  got  up  the  anchor  and  made  sail. 
As  the  sun  rose,  we  passed  Alexandria.  I  then  went 
into  the  hold  for  the  first  time,  and  there  found  my 
passengers  pretty  thickly  stowed.  I  distributed 
bread  among  them,  and  knocked  down  the  bulkhead 
between  the  hold  and  the  cabin,  in  order  that  they 
might  get  into  the  cabin  to  cook.  They  consisted  of 
men  and  women,  in  pretty  equal  proportions,  with  a 
number  of  boys  and  girls,  and  two  small  children. 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  31 

The  wind  kept  increasing  and  hauling  to  the  west 
ward.  Off  Fort  Washington  we  had  to  make  two 
stretches,  but  the  rest  of  the  way  we  run  before  the 
wind. 

Shortly  after  dinner,  we  passed  the  steamer  from 
Baltimore  for  Washington,  bound  up.  I  thought  the 
passengers  on  board  took  particular  notice  of  us  ;  but 
the  number  of  vessels  met  with  in  a  passage  up  the 
Potomac  at  that  season  is  so  few,  as  to  make  one,  at 
least  for  the  idle  passengers  of  a  steamboat,  an  object 
of  some  curiosity.  Just  before  sunset,  we  passed  a 
schooner  loaded  with  plaster,  bound  up.  As  we  ap 
proached  the  mouth  of  the  Potomac,  the  wind  hauled 
to  the  north,  and  blew  with  such  stiffness  as  would 
make  it  impossible  for  us  to  go  up  the  bay,  according 
to  our  original  plan.  Under  these  circumstances,  ap 
prehending  a  pursuit  from  Washington,  I  urged  Sayres 
to  go  to  sea,  with  the  intention  of  reaching  the  Del 
aware  by  the  outside  passage.  But  he  objected  that 
the  vessel  was  not  fit  to  go  outside  (which  was  true 
enough),  and  that  the  bargain  was  to  go  to  French- 
town.  Having  reached  Point  Lookout,  at  the  mouth 
of  the  river,  and  not  being  able  to  persuade  Sayres  to 
go  to  sea,  and  the  wind  being  dead  in  our  teeth,  and 
too  strong  to  allow  any  attempt  to  ascend  the  bay, 
we  came  to  anchor  in  Cornfield  harbor,  just  under 
Point  Lookout,  a  shelter  usually  sought  by  bay- 
craft  encountering  contrary  winds  when  in  that 
neighborhood. 

We  were  all  sleepy  with  being  up  all  the  night  be 
fore,  and,  soon  after  dropping  anchor,  we  all  turned 


32  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

in.  I  knew  nothing  more  till,  waking  suddenly,  I 
heard  the  noise  of  a  steamer  blowing  off  steam  along 
side  of  us.  I  knew  at  once  that  we  were  taken. 
The  black  men  came  to  the  cabin,  and  asked  if  they 
should  fight.  I  told  them  no  ;  we  had  no  arms, 
nor  was  there  the  least  possibility  of  a  successful 
resistance.  The  loud  shouts  and  trampling  of  many 
feet  overhead  proved  that  our  assailants  were  nu 
merous.  One  of  them  lifted  the  hatch  a  little,  and 
cried  out,  "  Niggers,  by  G — d  !"  an  exclamation  to 
which  the  others  responded  with  three  cheers,  and  by 
banging  the  buts  of  their  muskets  against  the  deck. 
A  lantern  was  called  for,  to  read  the  name  of  the 
vessel ;  arid  it  being  ascertained  to  be  the  Pearl,  a 
number  of  men  came  to  the  cabin-door,  and  called 
for  Captain  Drayton.  I  was  in  no  great  hurry  to 
stir ;  but  at  length  rose  from  my  berth,  saying  that  I 
considered  myself  their  prisoner,  and  that  I  expected 
to  be  treated  as  such.  While  I  was  dressing,  rather 
too  slowly  for  the  impatience  of  those  outside,  a  senti 
nel,  who  had  been  stationed  at  the  cabin-door,  followed 
every  motion  of  mine  with  his  gun,  which  he  kept 
pointed  at  me,  in  great  apprehension,  apparently, 
lest  I  should  suddenly  seize  some  dangerous  weapon 
and  make  at  him.  As  I  came  out  of  the  cabin-door, 
two  of  them  seized  me,  took  me  on  board  the  steamer 
and  tied  me  ;  and  they  did  the  same  with  Sayres  and 
English,  who  were  brought  on  board,  one  after  the 
other.  The  black  people  were  left  on  board  the 
Pearl,  which  the  steamer  took  in  tow,  and  then 
proceeded  up  the  river. 


OF    DANIEL    DF,AYTON.  33 

To  explain-this  sudden  change  in  our  situation,  it 
is  necessary  to  go  back  to  Washington.  Great 
was  the  consternation  in  several  families  of  that  city, 
on  Sunday  morning,  to  find  no  breakfast,  and,  what 
was  worse,  their  servants  missing.  Nor  was  this 
disaster  confined  to  Washington  only.  Georgetown 
came  in  for  a  considerable  share  of  it,  and  even  Al 
exandria,  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  river,  had  not 
entirely  escaped.  The  persons  who  had  taken  pas 
sage  on  board  the  Pearl  had  been  held  in  bondage 
by  no  less  than  forty-one  different  persons.  Great 
was  the  wonder  at  the  sudden  and  simultaneous  dis 
appearance  of  so  many  "  prime  hands,"  roughly 
estimated,  though  probably  with  considerable  exag 
geration,  as  worth  in  the  market  not  less  than  a  hun 
dred  thousand  dollars, — and  all  at  "one  fell  swoop" 
too,  as  the  District  Attorney  afterwards,  in  arguing 
the  case  against  me,  pathetically  expressed  it ! 
There  were  a  great  many  guesses  and  conjectures  as 
to  where  these  people  had  gone;  and  how  they  had 
gone ;  but  it  is  very  doubtful  whether  the  losers 
would  have  got  upon  the  right  track,  had  it  not  been 
for  the  treachery  of  a  colored  hackman,  who  had 
been  employed  to  carry  down  tc  the  vessel  two  pas 
sengers  who  had  been  in  hiding  for  some  weeks 
previous,  and  who  could  not  safely  walk  down,  lest 
they  might  be  met  and  recognized.  Emulating  the 
example  of  that  large,  and,  in  their  own  opinion  at 
least,  highly  moral,  religious  and  respectable  class 
of  white  people,  known  as  "  dough-faces,"  this  hack- 
man  thought  it  a  fine  opportunity  to  feather  his  nest 


34  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

by  playing  cat's-paw  to  the  slave-holders.  Seeing 
how  much  the  information  was  in  demand,  and 
anticipating,  no  doubt,  a  large  reward,  he  turned 
informer,  and  described  the  Pearl  as  the  conveyance 
which  the  fugitives  had  taken ;  and,  it  being  ascer 
tained  that  the  Pearl  had  actually  sailed  between  Sat 
urday  night  and  Sunday  morning,  preparations  were 
soon  made  to  pursue  her.  A  Mr.  Dodge,  of  George 
town,  a  wealthy  old  gentleman,  originally  from 
New  England,  missed  three  or  four  slaves  from  his 
family,  and  a  small  steamboat,  of  which  he  was  the 
proprietor,  was  readily  obtained.  Thirty-five  men, 
including  a  son  or  two  of  old  Dodge,  and  several  of 
those  whose  slaves  were  missing,  volunteered  to  man 
her  ;  and  they  set  out  about  Sunday  noon,  armed  to 
the  teeth  with  guns,  pistols,  bowie-knives,  &c..  and 
well  provided  with  brandy  and  other  liquors.  They 
heard  of  us  on  the  passage  down,  from  the  Baltimore 
steamer  and  the  vessel  loaded  with  plaster.  They 
reached  the  mouth  of  the  river,  and,  not  having 
found  the  Pearl,  were  about  to  return,  as  the 
steamer  could  not  proceed  into  the  bay  without  for 
feiting  her  insurance.  As  a  last  chance,  they  looked 
into  Cornfield  harbor,  where  they  found  us,  as  I 
have  related.  This  was  about  two  o'clock  in  the 
morning.  The  Pearl  had  come  to  anchor  about  nine 
o'clock  the  previous  evening.  It  is  a  hundred  and 
forty  miles  from  Washington  to  Cornfield  harbor. 

The  steamer,  with  the  Pearl  in  tow,  crossed  over 
from  Point  Lookout  to  Piney  Point,  on  the  south 
shore  of  the  Potomac,  and  here  the  Pearl  was  left  at 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  35 

anchor,  a  part  of  the  steamer's  company  remaining 
to  guard  her,  while  the  steamer,  having  myself  and 
the  other  white  prisoners  on  board,  proceeded  up 
Coan  river  for  a  supply  of  wood,  having  obtained 
which,  she  again,  about  noon  of  Monday,  took  the 
Pearl  in  tow  and  started  for  Washington. 

The  bearing,  manner  and  aspect  of  the  thirty- 
five  armed  persons  by  whom  we  had  been  thus 
seized  and  bound,  without  the  slightest  shadow  of 
lawful  authority,  was  sufficient  to  inspire  a  good 
deal  of  alarm.  We  had  been  lying  quietly  at  anchor 
in  a  harbor  of  Maryland ;  and,  although  the  owners 
of  the  slaves  might  have  had  a  legal  right  to  pur 
sue  and  take  them  back,  what  warrant  or  authority 
had  they  for  seizing  us  and  our  vessel  ?  They  could 
have  brought  none  from  the  District  of  Columbia, 
whose  officers  had  no  jurisdiction  or  authority  in 
Cornfield  harbor;  nor  did  they  pretend  to  have 
any  from  the  State  of  Maryland.  Some  of  them 
showed  a  good  deal  of  excitement,  and  evinced  a 
disposition  to  proceed  to  lynch  us  at  once.  A  man 
named  Houver,  who  claimed  as  his  property  two  of 
the  boys  passengers  on  board  the  Pearl,  put  me 
some  questions  in  a  very  insolent  tone  ;  to  which  I 
replied,  that  I  considered  myself  a  prisoner,  and  did 
not  wish  to  answer  any  questions ;  whereupon  one  of 
the  bystanders,  flourishing  a  dirk  in  my  face,  ex 
claimed,  "  If  I  was  in  his  place,  I  'd  put  this  through 
you  !  "  At  Piney  Point,  one  of  the  company  pro 
posed  to  hang  me  up  to  the  yard-arm,  and  make  me 
confess  ;  but  the  more  influential  of  those  on  board 


36  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

were  not  ready  for  any  such  violence,  though  all 
were  exceedingly  anxious  to  get  out  of  me  the  his 
tory  of  the  expedition,  and  who  my  employers  were. 
That  I  had  employers,  and  persons  of  note  too,  was 
taken  for  granted  on  all  hands  ;  nor  did  I  think  it 
worth  my  while  to  contradict  it,  though  I  declined 
steadily  to  give  any  information  on  that  point. 
Sayres  and  English  very  readily  told  all  that  they 
knew.  English,  especially,  was  in  a  great  state  of 
alarm,  and  cried  most  bitterly.  I  pitied  him  much, 
besides  feeling  some  compunctions  at  getting  him 
thus  into  difficulty;  and,  upon  the  representations 
which  I  made,  that  he  came  to  Washington  in  per 
fect  ignorance  of  the  object  of  the  expedition,  he  was 
finally  untied.  As  Sayres  was  obliged  to  admit  that 
he  came  to  Washington  to  take  away  colored  pas 
sengers,  he  was  not  regarded  with  so  much  favor. 
But  it  was  evidently  me  whom  they  looked  upon  as 
the  chief  culprit,  alone  possessing  a  knowledge  of  the 
history  and  origin  of  the  expedition,  which  they  were 
so  anxious  to  unravel.  They  accordingly  went  to 
work  very  artfully  to  worm  this  secret  out  of  me. 
I  was  placed  in  charge  of  one  Orme,  a  police-officer 
of  Georgetown,  whose  manner  towards  me  was  such 
as  to  inspire  me  with  a  certain  confidence  in  him ; 
who,  as  it  afterwards  appeared  from  his  testimony 
on  the  trial,  carefully  took  minutes  —  but,  as  it 
proved,  very  confused  and  incorrect  ones  — of  all 
that  I  said,  hoping  thus  to  secure  something  that 
might  turn  out  to  my  disadvantage.  Another  person, 
with  whom  I  had  a  good  deal  of  conversation,  and 


OF     DANIEL    DKAYTON.  37 

who  was  afterwards  produced  as  a  witness  against, 
me,  was  William  H.  Craig,  in  my  opinion  a  much 
more  conscientious  person  than  Orme,  who  seemed  to 
think  that  it  was  part  of  his  duty,  as  a  police-officer, 
to  testify  to  something,  at  all  hazards,  to  help  on  a 
conviction.  But  this  is  a  subject  to  which  I  shall 
have  occasion  to  return  presently. 

In  one  particular,  at  least,  the  testimony  of  both 
these  witnesses  was  correct  enough.  They  both 
testified  to  my  expressing  pretty  serious  apprehen 
sions  of  what  the  result  to  myself  was  likely  to 
be.  What  the  particular  provisions  were,  in  the  Dis 
trict  of  Columbia,  as  to  helping  slaves  to  escape,  I 
did  not  know ;  but  I  had  heard  that,  in  some  of  the 
slave-states,  they  were  very  severe :  in  fact,  I  was 
assured  by  Craig  that  I  had  committed  the  highest 
crime,  next  to  murder,  known  in  their  laws.  Under 
these  circumstances,  I  made  up  my  mind  that  the 
least  penalty  I  should  be  apt  to  escape  with  was 
confinement  in  the  penitentiary  for  life ;  and  it  is 
quite  probable  that  I  endeavored  to  console  myself, 
as  these  witnesses  testified,  with  the  idea  that,  after 
all,  it  might,  in  a  religious  point  of  view,  be  all  for 
the  best,  as  I  should  thus  be  removed  from  tempta 
tion,  and  have  ample  time  for  reflection  and  repent 
ance.  But  my  apprehensions  were  by  no  means  lim 
ited  to  what  I  might  suffer  under  the  forms  of  law. 
From  the  temper  exhibited  by  some  of  my  captors, 
and  from  the  vindictive  fury  with  which  the  idea  of 
enabling  the  enslaved  to  regain  their  liberty  was, 
I  knew,  generally  regarded  at  the  south,  I  appre- 
4 


38  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

hended  more  sudden  and  summary  proceedings  ;  and 
what  happened  afterwards  at  Washington  proved 
that  these  apprehensions  were  not  wholly  unfounded. 
The  idea  of  being  torn  in  pieces  by  a  furious  mob 
was  exceedingly  disagreeable.  Many  men,  who 
might  not  fear  death,  might  yet  not  choose  to  meet 
it  in  that  shape.  I  called  to  mind  the  apology  of 
the  Methodist  minister,  who,  just  after  a  declaration 
of  his  that  he  was  not  afraid  to  die,  ran  away  from 
a  furious  bull  that  attacked  him, —  "  that,  though  not 
fearing  death,  he  did  not  like  to  be  torn  in  pieces  by 
a  mad  bull."  1  related  this  anecdote  to  Craig,  and, 
as  he  testified  on  the  trial,  expressed  my  preference 
to  be  taken  on  the  deck  of  the  steamer  and  shot  at 
once,  rather  than  to  be  given  up  to  a  Washington  mob 
to  be  baited  and  murdered.  I  talked  pretty  freely 
with  Orme  and  Craig  about  myself,  the  circum 
stances  under  which  I  had  undertaken  this  enterprise, 
my  motives  to  it,  my  family,  my  past  misfortunes, 
and  the  fate  that  probably  awaited  me ;  but  they 
failed  to  extract  from  me,  what  they  seemed  chiefly 
to  desire,  any  information  which  would  implicate 
others.  Orme  told  me,  as  he  afterwards  testified, 
that  what  the  people  in  the  District  wanted  was  the 
principals ;  and  that,  if  I  would  give  information  that 
would  lead  to  them,  the  owners  of  the  slaves  would 
let  me  go,  or  sign  a  petition  for  my  pardon.  Craig 
also  made  various  inquiries  tending  to  the  same 
point.  Though  I  was  firmly  resolved  not  to  yield 
in  this  particular,  yet  I  was  desirous  to  do  all  I 
could  to  soften  the  feeling  against  me ;  and  it  was 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  39 

doubtless  this  desire  which  led  me  to  make  the  state 
ments  sworn  to  by  Orme  and  Craig,  that  I  had  no 
connection  with  the  persons  called  abolitionists, — 
which  was  true  enough ;  that  I  had  formerly  refused 
large  offers  made  me  by  slaves  to  carry  them  away  • 
and  that,  in  the  present  instance,  I  was  employed  by 
others,  and  was  to  be  paid  for  my  services. 

On  arriving  off  Fort  Washington,  the  steamer 
anchored  for  the  night,  as  the  captors  preferred  to 
make  their  triumphant  entry  into  the  city  by  day 
light.  Sayres  and  myself  were  watched  during  the 
night  by  a  regular  guard  of  two  men,  armed  with 
muskets,  who  were  relieved  from  time  to  time.  Be 
fore  getting  under  weigh  again, —  which  they  did 
about  seven  o'clock  in  the  morning  of  Tuesday,  Feb. 
18, — Sayres  and  myself  were  tied  together  arm- 
and-arm,  and  the  black  people  also,  two-and-two, 
with  the  other  arm  bound  behind  their  backs.  As  we 
passed  Alexandria,  we  were  all  ordered  on  deck,  and 
exhibited  to  the  mob  collected  on  the  wharves  to  get 
a  sight  of  us,  who  signified  their  satisfaction  by  three 
cheers.  When  we  landed  at  the  steamboat-wharf  in 
Washington,  which  is  a  mile  and  more  from  Penn 
sylvania  Avenue,  and  in  a  remote  part  of  the  city, 
but  few  people  had  yet  assembled.  We  were 
marched  up  in  a  long  procession,  Sayres  and  myself 
being  placed  at  the  head  of  it,  guarded  by  a  man  on 
each  side ;  English  following  next,  and  then  the 
negroes.  As  we  went  along,  the  mob  began  to  in 
crease  ;  and,  as  we  passed  Gannon's  slave-pen,  that 
slave-trader,  armed  with  a  knife,  rushed  out,  and, 


40  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

with  horrid  imprecations,  made  a  pass  at  me,  which 
was  very  near  finding  its  way  through  my  body. 
Instead  of  being  arrested,  as  he  ought  to  have  been, 
this  slave-dealer  was  politely  informed  that  I  was  in 
the  hands  of  the  law,  to  which  he  replied,  l  '•  D — n  the 
law  !  —  I  have  three  negroes,  and  I  will  give  them 
all  for  one  thrust  at  this  d — d  scoundrel !  "  and  he 
followed  along,  waiting  his  opportunity  to  repeat  the 
blow.  The  crowd,  by  this  time,  was  greatly  in 
creased.  We  met  an  immense  mob  of  several  thou 
sand  persons  coming  down  Four-and-a-half  street, 
with  the  avowed  intention  of  carrying  us  up  before 
the  capitol,  and  making  an  exhibition  of  us  there. 
The  noise  and  confusion  was  very  great.  It  seemed 
as  if  the  time  for  the  lynching  had  come.  When 
almost  up  to  Pennsylvania  Avenue,  a  rush  was  made 
upon  us, —  ' '  Lynch  them  !  lynch  them  !  the  d — n 
villains ! "  and  other  such  cries,  resounded  on  all  sides. 
Those  who  had  us  in  charge  were  greatly  alarmed  ; 
and,  seeing  no  other  way  to  keep  us  from  the  hands 
of  the  mob,  they  procured  a  hack,  and  put  Sayres 
and  myself  into  it.  The  hack  drove  to  the  jail,  the 
mob  continuing  to  follow,  repeating  their  shouts  and 
threats.  Several  thousand  people  surrounded  the 
jail,  filling  up  the  enclosure  about  it. 

Our  captors  had  become  satisfied,  from  the  state 
ments  made  by  Sayres  and  myself,  and  from  his  own 
statements  and  conduct,  that  the  participation  of 
English  in  the  affair  was  not  of  a  sort  that  required 
any  punishment ;  and  when  the  mob  made  the  rush 
upon  us,  the  persons  having  him  in  charge  had 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  41 

let  him  go,  with  the  intention  that  he  should  escape. 
After  a  while  he  had  found  his  way  back  to  the 
steamboat  wharf;  but  the  steamer  was  gone.  Alone 
in  a  strange  place,  and  not  knowing  what  to  do,  he 
told  his  story  to  somebody  whom  he  met,  who  put 
him  in  a  hack  and  sent  him  up  to  the  jail.  It  was 
a  pity  he  lacked  the  enterprise  to  take  care  of  him 
self  when  set  at  liberty,  as  it  cost  him  four  months' 
imprisonment  and  his  friends  some  money.  I  ought 
to  have  mentioned  before  that,  on  arriving  within  the 
waters  of  the  District,  Sayres  and  myself  had  been 
examined  before  a  justice  of  the  peace,  who  was  one 
of  the  captors  ;  and  who  had  acted  as  their  leader. 
He  had  made  out  a  commitment  against  us,  but  none 
against  English ;  so  that  the  persons  who  had  him  in 
charge  were  right  enough  in  letting  him  go. 

Sayres  and  myself  were  at  first  put  into  the  same 
cell,  but,  towards  night,  we  were  separated.  A  per 
son  named  Goddard,  connected  with  the  police,  came 
to  examine  us.  He  went  to  Sayres  first.  He  then 
came  to  me,  when  I  told  him  that,  as  I  supposed  he 
had  got  the  whole  story  out  of  Sayres,  and  as  it  was 
not  best  that  two  stories  should  be  told,  I  would  say 
nothing.  Goddard  then  took  from  me  my  money. 
One  of  the  keepers  threw  me  in  two  thin  blankets, 
and  I  was  left  to  sleep  as  I  could.  The  accommo 
dations  were  not  of  the  most  luxurious  kind.  The 
cell  had  a  stone  floor,  which,  with  the  help  of  a 
blanket,  was  to  serve  also  for  a  bed.  There  was 
neither  chair,  table,  stool,  nor  any  individual  piece 
of  furniture  of  any  kind,  except  a  night-bucket  and  a 
4* 


£  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

water-can.  I  was  refused  my  overcoat  and  valise, 
and  had  nothing  but  my  water-can  to  make  a  pillow  of. 
With  such  a  pillow,  and  the  bare  stone  floor  for  my 
bed,  looked  upon  by  all  whom  I  saw  with  apparent 
abhorrence  and  terror, — as  much  so.  to  all  appearance, 
as  if  I  had  been  a  murderer,  or  taken  in  some  other 
desperate  crime, — remembering  the  execrations  which 
the  mob  had  belched  forth  against  me,  and  uncertain 
whether  a  person  would  be  found  to  express  the  least 
sympathy  for  me  (which  might  not,  in  the  existing 
state  of  the  public  feeling,  be  safe),  it  may  be  imag 
ined  that  my  slumbers  were  not  very  sound. 

Meanwhile  the  rage  of  the  mob  had  taken,  for  the 
moment,  another  direction.  I  had  heard  it  said, 
while  we  were  coming  up  in  the  steamboat,  that  the 
abolition  press  must  be  stopped ;  and  the  mob  ac 
cordingly,  as  the  night  came  on,  gathered  about  the 
office  of  the  National  Era,  with  threats  to  de 
stroy  it.  Some  little  mischief  was  done ;  but  the 
property-holders  in  the  city,  well  aware  how  depend 
ent  Washington  is  upon  the  liberality  of  Congress, 
were  unwilling  that  anything  should  occur  to  place 
the  District  in  bad  odor  at  the  north.  Some  of  them, 
also,  it  is  but  justice  to  believe,  could  not  entirely 
give  in  to  the  slave-holding  doctrine  and  practice  of 
suppressing  free  discussion  by  force  ;  and,  by  their 
efforts,  seconded  by  a  drenching  storm  of  rain,  that 
came  on  between  nine  and  ten  o'clock,  the  mob  were 
persuaded  to  disperse  for  the  present.  The  jail  was 
guarded  that  night  by  a  strong  body  of  police,  serious 
apprehensions  being  entertained,  lest  the  mob.  insti- 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  43 

gated  by  the  violence  of  many  southern  members  of 
Congress,  should  break  in  and  lynch  us.  Great 
apprehension,  also,  seemed  to  be  felt  at  the  jail,  lest 
we  might  be  rescued  ;  and  we  were  subject,  during 
the  night,  to  frequent  examinations,  to  see  that  all 
was  safe.  Great  was  the  terror,  as  well  as  the  rage, 
which  the  abolitionists  appeared  to  inspire.  They 
seemed  to  be  thought  capable,  if  not  very  narrowly 
watched,  of  taking  us  off  through  the  roof,  or  the 
stone  floor,  or  out  of  the  iron-barred  doors ;  and,  from 
the  half-frightened  looks  which  the  keepers  gave  me 
from  time  to  time,  I  could  plainly  enough  read  their 
thoughts, —  that  a  fellow  who  had  ventured  on  such 
an  enterprise  as  that  of  the  Pearl  was  desperate  and 
daring  enough  to  attempt  anything.  For  a  poor 
prisoner  like  me,  so  much  in  the  power  of  his  cap 
tors,  arid  without  the  slightest  means,  hopes,  or  even 
thoughts  of  escape,  it  was  some  little  satisfaction  to 
observe  the  awe  and  terror  which  he  inspired. 

Of  the  prison  fare  I  shall  have  more  to  say,  by  and 
by.  It  is  sufficient  to  state  here  that  it  was  about  on 
a  par  with  the  sleeping  accommodations,  and  hardly 
of  a  sort  to  give  a  man  in  my  situation  the  necessary 
physical  vigor.  However,  I  thought  little  of  this  at 
that  moment,  as  I  was  too  sick  and  excited  to  feel 
much  disposition  to  eat. 

The  Washington  prison  is  a  large  three-story 
stone  building,  the  front  part  of  the  lower  story  of 
which  is  occupied  by  the  guard-room,  or  jail-office, 
and  by  the  kitchen  and  sleeping  apartments  for  the 
keepers.  The  back  part,  shut  off  from  the  front  by 


44  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

strong  grated  doors,  has  a  winding  stone  staircase, 
ascending  in  the  middle,  on  each  side  of  which,  on 
each  of  the  three  stories,  are  passage-ways,  also  shut 
off  from  the  stair-case,  by  grated  iron  doors.  The 
back  wall  of  the  jail  forms  one  side  of  these  passages, 
which  are  lighted  by  grated  windows.  On  the  other 
side  are  the  cells,  also  with  grated  iron  doors,  and 
receiving  their  light  and  air  entirely  from  the  pas 
sages.  The  passages  themselves  have  no  ventila 
tion  except  through  the-  doors  and  windows,  which 
answer  that  purpose  very  imperfectly.  The  front 
second  story,  over  the  guard-room,  contains  the  cells 
for  the  female  prisoners.  The  front  third  story  is  the 
debtors'  apartment. 

The  usage  of  the  jail  always  has  been  —  except 
in  cases  of  insubordination  or  attempted  escape, 
when  locking  up  in  the  cells  by  day,  as  well  as  by 
night,  has  been  resorted  to  as  a  punishment  —  to 
allow  the  prisoners,  during  the  daytime,  the  use  of 
the  passages,  for  the  benefit  of  light,  air  and  exercise. 
Indeed,  it  is  hard  to  conceive  a  more  cruel  punish 
ment  than  to  keep  a  man  locked  up  all  the  time  in 
one  of  these  half-lighted,  unventilated  cells.  On  the 
morning  of  the  second  day  of  our  confinement,  we 
too  were  let  out  into  the  passage.  But  we  were  soon 
put  back  again,  and  not  only  into  separate  cells,  but 
into  separate  passages,  so  as  to  be  entirely  cut  off 
from  any  communication  with  each  other.  It  was  a 
long  time  before  we  were  able  to  regain  the  privilege 
of  the  passage.  But,  for  the  present,  I  shall  pass 
over  the  internal  economy  and  administration  of  the 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  45 

prison,  and  my  treatment  in  it,  intending,  further  on, 
to  give  a  general  sketch  of  that  subject. 

About  nine  or  ten  o'clock,  Mr.  Giddings,  the  mem 
ber  of  Congress  from  Ohio,  came  to  see  us.  There 
was  some  disposition,  I  understood,  not  to  allow  him 
to  enter  the  jail ;  but  Mr.  Giddings  is  a  man  not 
easily  repulsed,  and  there  is  nobody  of  whom  the 
good  people  at  Washington,  especially  the  office 
holders,  who  make  up  so  large  a  part  of  the  popula 
tion,  stand  so  much  in  awe*  as  a  member  of  Con 
gress  ;  especially  a  member  of  Mr.  Giddings'  well- 
known  fearless  determination.  He  was  allowed  to 
come  in,  bringing  another  person  with  him,  but  was 
followed  into  the  jail  by  a  crowd  of  ruffians,  who 
compelled  the  turnkey  to  admit  them  into  the  pas 
sage,  and  who  vented  their  rage  in  execration  and 
threats.  Mr.  Giddings  said  that  he  had  understood  we 
were  here  in  jail  without  counsel  or  friends,  and  that 
he  had  come  to  let  us  know  that  we  should  not  want 
for  either;  and  he  introduced  the  person  he  had- 
brought  with  him  as  one  who  was  willing  to  act 
temporarily  as  our  counsel.  Not  long  after,  Mr. 
David  A.  Hall,  a  lawyer  of  the  District,  came  to 
offer  his  services  to  us  in  the  same  way.  Key,  the 
United  States  Attorney  for  the  District,  and  who,  as 
such,  had  charge  of  the  proceedings  against  us,  was 
there  at  the  same  time.  He  advised  Mr.  Hall  to 
leave  the  jail  and  go  home  immediately,  as  the  people 
outside  were  furious,  and  he  ran  the  risk  of  his  life. 
To  which  Mr.  Hall  replied  that  things  had  come  to 
a  pretty  pass,  if  a  man's  counsel  was  not  to  have  the 


46  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

privilege  of  talking  with  him.  "  Poor  devils  ! "  said 
the  District  Attorney,  as  he  went  out,  "I  pity  them, — 
they  are  to  be  made  scape-goats  for  others  !  ' '  Yet 
the  rancor,  and  virulence,  and  fierce  pertinacity  with 
which  this  Key  afterwards  pursued  me,  did  not  look 
much  like  pity.  No  doubt  he  was  a  good  deal 
irritated  at  his  ill  success  in  getting  any  information 
out  of  me. 

The  seventy-six  passengers  found  on  board  the 
Pearl  had  been  committed  to  the  jail  as  runaways; 
and  Mr.  Giddings,  on  going  up  to  the  House,  by  way 
of  warning,  I  suppose,  to  the  slave-holders,  that  they 
were  not  to  be  allowed  to  have  everything  their  own 
way,  moved  an  inquiry  into  the  circumstances  under 
which  seventy-six  persons  were  held  prisoners  in  the 
District  jail,  merely  for  attempting  to  vindicate  their 
inalienable  rights.  Mr.  Hale  also,  in  the  Senate,  in 
consequence  of  the  threats  held  out  to  destroy  the 
Era  office,  and  to  put  a  stop  to  the  publication  of 
that  paper,  moved  a  resolution  of  inquiry  into  the 
necessity  of  additional  laws  for  the  protection  of 
property  in  the  District.  The  fury  which  these 
movements  excited  in  the  minds  of  the  slave-holders 
found  expression  in  the  editorial  columns  of  the 
Washington  Union,  in  an  article  which  I  have  in 
serted  below,  as  forming  a  curious  contrast  to  the 
exultations  of  that  print,  only  a  week  before,  and 
to  which  I  have  had  occasion  already  to  refer,  over 
the  spread  of  the  principles  of  liberty  and  universal 
emancipation.  The  violent  attack  upon  Mr.  Gid 
dings,  because  he  had  visited  us  three  poor  prisoners 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  47 

in  jail,  and  offered  us  the  assistance  of  counsel, —  as 
if  the  vilest  criminals  were  not  entitled  to  have  coun 
sel  to  defend  them, —  is  well  worthy  of  notice.  The 
following  is  the  article  referred  to. 

THE    ABOLITION    INCENDIARIES. 

Those  two  abolition  incendiaries  (Giddings  and  Hale) 
threw  firebrands  yesterday  into  the  two  houses  of  Congress. 
The  western  abolitionist  moved  a  resolution  of  inquiry  into 
the  transactions  now  passing  in  Washington,  which  brought 
on  a  fierce  and  fiery  debate  on  the  part  of  the  southern 
members,  in  the  course  of  which  Mr.  Giddings  was  com 
pelled  to  confess,  on  the  cross-questioning  of  Messrs.  Ven- 
able  and  Haskell,  that  he  had  visited  the  three  piratical  kid 
nappers  now  confined  in  jail,  and  offered  them  counsel.  The 
reply  of  Mr.  Toombs,  of  Georgia,  was  scorching  to  an 
intense  degree. 

The  abolitionist  John  P.  Hale  threw  a  firebrand  resolu 
tion  into  the  Senate,  calling  for  additional  laws  to  compel 
this  city  to  prevent  riots.  This  also  gave  rise  to  a  long  and 
excited  debate. 

No  question  was  taken,  in  either  house,  before  they 
adjourned.  But,  in  the  progress  of  the  discussion  in  both 
houses,  some  doctrines  were  uttered  which  are  calculated  to 
startle  the  friends  of  the  Union.  Giddings  justified  the  kid 
nappers,  and  contended  that,  though  the  act  was  legally 
forbidden,  it  was  not  morally  wrong  !  Mr.  Toombs  brought 
home  the  practical  consequences  of  this  doctrine  to  the 
member  from  Ohio  in  a  most  impressive  manner. 

Hale,  of  the  Senate,  whilst  he  was  willing  to  protect  the 
abolitionist,  expressed  himself  willing  to  relax  the  laws  and 
weaken  the  protection  which  is  given  to  the  slave  property 


48  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

in  this  district !  Mr.  Davis,  of  Massachusetts,  held  the 
strange  doctrine,  that  while  he  would  not  disturb  the  rights 
of  the  slave-holders,  he  would  not  cease  to  discuss  those 
rights !  As  if  Congress  ought  to  discuss,  or  to  protect  a 
right  to  discuss,  a  domestic  institution  of  the  Southern 
States,  with  which  they  had  no  right  to  interfere  !  Why 
discuss,  when  they  cannot  act  ?  Why  first  lay  down  an 
abstract  principle,  which  they  intend  to  violate  in  practice  ? 
Such  fanatics  as  Giddings  and  Hale  are  doing  more  mis 
chief  than  they  will  be  able  to  atone  for.  Their  incessant  and 
impertinent  intermeddling  with  the  most  delicate  question 
in  our  social  relations  is  creating  the  most  indignant  feel 
ings  in  the  community.  The  fiery  discussions  they  are 
exciting  are  calculated  to  provoke  the  very  riots  which  they 
deprecate.  Let  these  madmen  forbear,  if  they  value  the 
tranquillity  of  our  country,  and  the  stability  of  our  Union. 
We  conjure  them  to  forbear  their  maddened,  parricidal 
hand. 

An  article  like  this  in  the  Union  was  well  calcu 
lated,  and  probably  was  intended,  to  encourage  and 
stimulate  the  rioters,  and  accordingly  they  assembled 
that  same  evening  in  greater  force  than  before, 
threatening  the  destruction  of  the  Era  office.  The 
publication  office  of  the  Era  was  not  far  from  the 
Patent  Office  ;  and  the  dwelling-house  of  Dr.  Bailey, 
the  editor,  was  at  no  great  distance.  The  mob, 
taking  upon  themselves  the  character  of  a  meeting 
of  citizens,  appointed  a  committee  to  wait  upon  Dr. 
Bailey,  to  require  him  to  remove  his  press  out  of  the 
District  of  Columbia.  Of  course,  as  I  was  locked 
up  in  the  jail,  trying  to  rest  my  aching  head  and 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  49 

weary  limbs,  with  a  stone  floor  for  a  bed  and  a 
water-can  for  my  pillow,  I  can  have  no  personal 
knowledge  of  what  transpired  on  this  occasion.  But 
a  correspondent  of  the  New  York  Tribune,  who 
probably  was  an  eye-witness,  gives  the  following 
account  of  the  interview  between  the  committee  and 
Dr.  Bailey  : 

Clearing  his  throat,  the  leader  of  the  committee  stretched 
forth  his  hand,  and  thus  addressed  Dr.  Bailey  : 

Mr.  Raddiff.  —  Sir,  we  have  been  appointed  as  a  com 
mittee  to  wait  upon  you,  by  the  meeting  of  the  citizens  of 
Washington  which  has  assembled  this  evening  to  take  into 
consideration  the  circumstances  connected  with  the  late 
outrage  upon  our  property,  and  to  convey  to  you  the  result 
of  the  deliberations  of  that  meeting.  You  are  aware  of  the 
excitement  wrhich  now  prevails.  It  has  assumed  a  most 
threatening  aspect.  This  community  is  satisfied  that  the 
existence  of  your  press  among  us  is  endangering  the  public 
peace,  and  they  are  convinced  that  the  public  interests  de 
mand  its  removal.  We  have  therefore  waited  upon  you  for 
the  purpose  of  inquiring  whether  you  are  prepared  to 
remove  your  press  by  ten  o'clock  to-morrow  morning ;  and 
we  beseech  you,  as  you  value  the  peace  of  this  District,  to 
accede  to  our  request.  [Loud  shouting  heard  at  the  Patent 
Office.] 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  Gentlemen  :  I  do  not  believe  you  are  actu 
ated  by  any  unkind  feelings  towards  me  personally;  but 
you  must  be  aware  that  you  are  demanding  of  me  the  sur 
render  of  a  great  constitutional  right,  —  a  right  which  I 
have  used,  but  not  abused,  —  in  the  preservation  of  which 
you  are  as  deeply  interested  as  I  am.  How  can  you  ask 
5 


50  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

me  to  abandon  it,  and  thus  become  a  party  to  my  own. 
degradation  ? 

Mr.  Radclijf.  —  We  subscribe  to  all  that  you  say.  But 
you  see  the  popular  excitement.  The  consequences  of  your 
refusal  are  inevitable.  Now,  if  you  can  avert  these  conse 
quences  by  submitting  to  what  the  people  request,  although 
unreasonable,  is  it  not  your  duty,  as  a  good  citizen,  to  sub 
mit  ?  It  is  on  account  of  the  community  we  come  here, 
obeying  the  popular  feeling  which  you  hear  expressed  in  the 
distance,  and  which  cannot  be  calmed,  and,  but  for  the 
course  we  have  adopted,  would  at  this  moment  be  mani 
fested  in  the  destruction  of  your  office.  But  they  have  con 
sented  to  wait  till  they  hear  our  report.  We  trust,  then,  that, 
as  a  good  citizen,  you  will  respond  favorably  to  the  wish  of 
the  people. 

Another  of  the  Committee. —  As  one  of  the  oldest,  citizens, 
I  do  assure  you  that  it  is  in  all  kindness  we  make  this 
request.  We  come  here  to  tell  you  that  we  cannot  arrest 
violence  in  any  other  way  than  by  your  allowing  us  to  say 
that  you  yield  to  the  request  of  the  people.  In  kindness  we 
tell  you  that  if  this  thing  commences  here  we  know  not 
where  it  may  end.  I  am  for  mild  measures  myself.  The 
prisoners  were  in  my  hands,  but  I  would  not  allow  my 
men  to  inflict  any  punishment  on  them. 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  Gentlemen,  I  appreciate  your  kindness  ; 
but  I  ask,  is  there  a  man  among  you  who,  standing  as  I  now 
stand,  the  representative  of  a  free  press,  would  accede  to  this 
demand,  and  abandon  his  rights  as  an  American  citizen  ? 

One  of  the  Committee.  —  We  know  it  is  a  great  sacrifice 
that  we  ask  of  you;  but  we  ask  it  to  appease  popular 
excitement. 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  Let  me  say  to  you  that  I  am  a  peace-man. 
I  have  taken  no  measures  to  defend  my  office,  my  house  or 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  51 

myself.  I  appeal  to  the  good  sense  and  intelligence  of  the 
community,  and  stand  upon  my  rights  as  an  American 
citizen,  looking  to  the  law  alone  for  protection. 

Mr.  Raddiff.  —  We  have  now  discharged  our  duty.  It 
has  come  to  this, —  the  people  say  it  must  be  done,  unless 
you  agree  to  go  to-morrow.  We  now  ask  a  categorical 
answer,  —  Will  you  remove  your  press  ? 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  I  answer  :  I  make  no  resistance,  and  I 
cannot  assent  to  your  demand.  The  press  is  there  —  it  is 
undefended  —  you  can  do  as  you  think  proper. 

One  of  the  Committee.  —  All  rests  with  you.  We  tell  you 
what  will  follow  your  refusal,  and,  if  you  persist,  all  the 
responsibility  must  fall  upon  your  shoulders.  It  is  in  your 
power  to  arrest  the  arm  that  is  raised  to  give  the  blow.  If 
you  refuse  to  do  so  by  a  single  expression,  though  it  might 
cost  you  much,  on  you  be  all  the  consequences. 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  You  demand  the  sacrifice  of  a  great  right. 
You  — 

One  of  the  Committee  (interrupting  him).  —  I  know  it  is 
a  hardship ;  but  look  at  the  consequences  of  your  refusal. 
We  do  not  come  here  to  express  our  individual  opinions.  I 
would  myself  leave  the  District  to-morrow,  if  in  your  place. 
We  now  ask  of  you,  Shall  this  be  done  ?  We  beg  you  will 
consider  this  matter  in  the  light  in  which  we  view  it. 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  I  am  one  man  against  many.  But  I  can 
not  sacrifice  any  right  that  I  possess.  Those  who  have  sent 
you  here  may  do  as  they  think  proper. 

One  of  the  Committee.  —  The  whole  community  is  against 
you.  They  say  here  is  an  evil  that  threatens  them,  and 
they  ask  you  to  remove  that  evil.  You  say  "  No  !  "  and 
of  course  on  your  head  be  all  the  consequences. 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  Let  me  remind  you  that  we  have  been 
recently  engaged  in  public  rejoicings.  For  what  have  we 


52  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

rejoiced  ?  Because  the  people  in  another  land  have  arisen, 
and  triumphed  over  the  despot,  who  had  done  —  what?  He 
did  not  demolish  presses,  but  he  imprisoned  editors.  In 
other  words,  he  enslaved  the  press.  Will  you  then  present 
to  America  and  the  world  — 

One  of  the  Committee  (interrupting  him}.  —  If  we  could 
stop  this  movement  of  the  people,  we  would  do  it.  But  you 
make  us  unable  to  do  so.  We  cannot  tell  how  far  it  will 
go.  After  your  press  is  pulled  down,  we  do  not  know 
where  they  will  go  next.  It  is  your  duty,  in  such  a  case, 
to  sacrifice  your  constitutional  rights. 

Dr.  Bailey.  —  I  presume,  when  they  shall  have  accom 
plished  their  object  — 

Mr.  Radcliff  (interrupting}. —  We  advise  you  to  be  out 
of  the  way  !  The  people  think  that  your  press  endangers 
their  property  and  their  lives  ;  and  they  have  appointed  us 
to  tell  you  so,  and  ask  you  to  remove  it  to-morrow;  If  you 
say  that  you  will  do  so,  they  will  retire  satisfied.  If  you 
refuse,  they  say  they  will  tear  it  down.  Here  is  Mr.  Boyle, 
a  gentleman  of  property,  and  one  of  our  oldest  residents. 
You  see  that  we  are  united.  If  you  hold  out  and  occupy 
your  position,  the  men,  women  and  children  of  the  District 
will  universally  rise  up  against  you. 

Dr.  Bailey  (addressing  himself  to  his  father,  a  venerable 
man  of  more  than  eighty  years  of  age,  who  approached  the 
doorway  and  commenced  remonstrating  with  the  committee}. 
—  You  do  not  understand  the  matter,  father ;  these  gentle 
men  are  a  committee  appointed  by  a  meeting  assembled  in 
front  of  the  Patent  Office.  You  need  not  address  remon 
strances  to  them.  Gentlemen,  you  appreciate  my  position. 
I  cannot  surrender  my  rights.  Were  I  to  die  for  it,  I  cannot 
surrender  my  rights  !  Tell  those  who  sent  you  hither  that 
my  press  and  my  house  are  undefended  —  they  must  do  as 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  53 

they  see  proper.    I  maintain  my  rights,  and  make  no  resist 
ance  ! 

The  committee  then  retired,  and  Dr.  Bailey  reentered  his 
dwelling.  Meanwhile,  the  shouts  of  the  mob,  as  they 
received  the  reports  of  the  committee,  were  reechoed  along 
the  streets.  A  fierce  yell  greeted  the  reappearance  of  Rad- 
cliffin  front  of  the  Patent  Office.  He  announced  the  result 
of  the  interview  with  the  editor  of  the  Era.  Shouts,  impre 
cations,  blasphemy,  burst  from  the  crowd.  "  Down  with 
the  Era ! "  "  Now  for  it !  "  "  Gut  the  office  !  "  were  the 
exclamations  heard  on  all  sides,  and  the  mob  rushed  tumult- 
uously  to  Seventh-street. 

But  a  body  of  the  city  police  had  been  stationed 
to  guard  the  building,  and  the  mob  finally  contented 
themselves  with  passing  a  resolution  to  pull  it  down 
the  next  day  at  ten  o'clock,  if  the  press  was  not 
meanwhile  removed. 

That  same  afternoon,  we  three  prisoners  had  been 
taken  before  three  justices,  who  held  a  court  within 
the  jail  for  our  examination.  Mr.  Hall  appeared  as 
our  counsel.  The  examination  was  continued  till 
the  next  day,  when  we  were,  all  three  of  us,  recom 
mitted  to  jail,  on  a  charge  of  stealing  slaves,  our  bail 
being  fixed  at  a  thousand  dollars  for  each  slave,  or 
seventy-six  thousand  dollars  for  each  of  us. 

Meanwhile,  both  houses  of  Congress  became 
the  scenes  of  very  warm  debates,  growing  out  of  cir 
cumstances  connected  with  our  case.  In  the  Senate, 
Mr.  Hale,  agreeably  to  the  notice  he  had  given, 
asked  leave  to  introduce  a  bill  for  the  protection  of 
property  in  the  District  of  Columbia  against  the 


54  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

violence  of  mobs.  This  bill,  as  was  stated  in  the 
debate,  was  copied,  almost  word  for  word,  from  a 
law  in  force  in  the  State  of  Maryland  (and  many 
other  states  have  —  and  all  ought  to  have  —  a  sim 
ilar  law),  making  the  cities  and  towns  liable  for  any 
property  which  might  be  destroyed  in  them  by  mob 
violence.  In  the  House  the  subject  came  up  on  a 
question  of  privilege,  raised  by  Mr.  Palfrey,  of  Mas 
sachusetts,  who  offered  a  resolution  for  the  appoint 
ment  of  a  select  committee  to  inquire  into  the 
currently-reported  facts  that  a  lawless  mob  had 
assembled  during  the  two  previous  nights,  setting  at 
defiance  the  constituted  authorities  of  the  United 
States,  and  menacing  members  of  Congress  and  other 
persons.  In  both  those  bodies  the  debate  was  very 
warm,  as  any  one  interested  in  it  will  find,  by  read 
ing  it  in  the  columns  of  the  Congressional  Globe. 

It  was  upon  this  occasion,  during  the  debate  in 
the  Senate,  that  Mr.  Foote,  then  a  senator  from  Mis 
sissippi,  and  now  governor  of  that  state,  whose 
speech  on  the  French  revolution  has  been  already 
quoted,  threatened  to  join  in  lynching  Mr.  Hale,  if 
he  ever  set  foot  in  Mississippi,  whither  he  invited 
him  to  come  for  that  purpose.  This  part  of  the 
debate  was  so  peculiar  and  so  characteristic,  showing 
so  well  the  spirit  with  which  the  District  of  Colum 
bia  was  then  blazing  against  me,  that  I  cannot  help 
giving  the  following  extract  from  Mr.  Foote' s  speech, 
as  contained  in  the  official  report : 

"  All  must  see  that  the  course  of  the  senator  from  New 


OF   DANIEL    DRAYTON.  65 

Hampshire  is  calculated  to  embroil  the  confederacy  —  to 
put  in  peril  our  free  institutions  —  to  jeopardize  that  Union 
which  our  forefathers  established,  and  which  every  pure 
patriot  throughout  the  country  desires  shall  be  perpetuated. 
Can  any  man  be  a  patriot  who  pursues  such  a  course  ?  Is 
he  an  enlightened  friend  of  freedom,  or  even  a  judicious 
friend  of  those  with  whom  he  affects  to  sympathize,  who 
adopts  such  a  course  ?  Who  does  not  know  that  such  men 
are,  practically,  the  worst  enemies  of  the  slaves  ?  I  do  not 
beseech  the  gentleman  to  stop ;  but,  if  he  perseveres,  he  will 
awaken  indignation  everywhere,  and  it  cannot  be  that  en 
lightened  men,  who  conscientiously  belong  to  the  faction  at 
the  north  of  which  he  is  understood  to  be  the  head,  can 
sanction  or  approve  everything  that  he  may  do,  under  the 
influence  of  excitement,  in  this  body.  I  will  close  by 
saying  that,  if  he  really  wishes  glory,  and  to  be  regarded  as 
the  great  liberator  of  the  blacks,  —  if  he  wishes  to  be  par 
ticularly  distinguished  in  this  cause  of  emancipation,  as  it 
is  called,  —  let  him,  instead  of  remaining  here  in  the  Sen 
ate  of  the  United  States,  or  instead  of  secreting  himself  in 
some  dark  corner  of  New  Hampshire,  where  he  may  possi 
bly  escape  the  just  indignation  of  good  men  throughout  this 
republic,  —  let  him  visit  the  good  State  of  Mississippi,  in 
which-I  have  the  honor  to  reside,  and  no  doubt  he  will  be 
received  with  such  shouts  of  joy  as  have  rarely  marked  the 
reception  of  any  individual  in  this  day  and  generation.  I 
invite  him  there,  and  will  tell  him,  beforehand,  in  all  hon 
esty,  that  he  could  not  go  ten  miles  into  the  interior  before 
he  would  grace  one  of  the  tallest  trees  in  the  forest,  with  a 
rope  around  his  neck,  with  the  approbation  of  every  virtu 
ous  and  patriotic  citizen  ;  and  that,  if  necessary,  I  should 
myself  assist  in  the  operation  !  " 

Mr.  Hale's  reply  was  equally  characteristic  : 


56  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

"  The  honorable  Senator  invites  me  to  visit  the  State  of 
Mississippi,  and  kindly  informs  me  that  he  would  be  one  of 
those  who  would  act  the  assassin,  and  put  an  end  to  my 
career.  He  would  aid  in  bringing  me  to  public  execution,  — 
no,  death  by  a  mob !  Well,  in  return  for  his  hospitable  in 
vitation.  I  can  only  express  the  desire  that  he  would  pene 
trate  into  some  of  the  dark  corners  of  New  Hampshire ;  and, 
if  he  do,  I  am  much  mistaken  if  he  would  not  find  that  the 
people  in  that  benighted  region  would  be  very  happy  to 
listen  to  his  arguments,  and  engage  in  an  intellectual  con 
flict  with  him,  in  which  the  truth  might  be  elicited.  I 
think,  however,  that  the  announcement  which  the  honorable 
Senator  has  made  on  this  floor  of  the  fate  which  awaits  so 
humble  an  individual  as  myself  in  the  State  of  Mississippi 
must  convince  every  one  of  the  propriety  of  the  high  eulo- 
gium  which  he  pronounced  upon  her,  the  other  day,  when  he 
spoke  of  the  high  position  which  she  occupied  among  the 
states  of  this  confederacy.  —  But  enough  of  this  personal 
matter."* 

*  The  following  paragraph,  which  has  recently  been  going  the  rounds 
of  the  newspapers,  will  serve  to  show  the  sort  of  manners  which  pre 
vail  in  the  state  so  fitly  represented  by  Mr.  Foote,  and  how  these 
southern  ruffians  experience  in  their  own  families  the  natural  effect 
of  the  blood-thirsty  sentiments  which  they  so  freely  avow  : 

"  THE  DEATH  OF  MB.  CARNEAL. —  The  Vicksburg  Sentinel,  of  the  13th 
ult.,  gives  the  following  account  of  the  shooting  of  Mr.  Thomas  Carneal, 
son-in-law  of  Governor  Foote  : 

"  We  have  abstained  thus  long  from  giving  any  notice  of  the  sad 
affair  which  resulted  in  the  death  of  Mr.  Thomas  Carneal,  the  son-in- 
law  of  the  governor  of  our  state,  that  we  might  get  the  particulars.  It 
seems  that  the  steamer  E.  C.  Watkins,  with  Mr.  Carneal  as  a  passenger, 
landed  at  or  near  the  plantation  of  Judge  James,  in  Washington  county. 
Mr.  Carneal  had  heard  that  the  judge  was  an  extremely  brutal  man  to 
his  slaves,  and  was  likewise  excited  with  liquor  ;  and,  upon  the  judge 
inviting  him  and  others  to  take  a  drink  with  him,  Carneal  replied  that 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  57 

Such  was  the  savage  character  of  the  debate,  that 
even  Mr.  Calhoun,  who  was  not  generally  discour 
teous,  rinding  himself  rather  hard  pressed  by  some 
of  Mr.  Male's  arguments,  excused  himself  from  an 
answer,  on  the  ground  that  Mr.  Hale  was  a  maniac  ! 
The  slave-holders  set  upon  Mr.  Hale  with  all  their 
force ;  but,  though  they  succeeded  in  voting  down 
his  bill,  it  was  generally  agreed,  and  anybody  may 
see  by  the  report,  that  he  had  altogether  the  best  of 
the  argument.  Mr.  Palfrey's  resolution  was  also  lost ; 
but  the  boldness  with  which  Giddings  and  others 
avowed  their  opinions,  and  the  freedom  of  speech 

he  would  not  drink  with  a  man  who  abused  his  negroes  ;  this  the  judge 
resented  as  an  insult,  and  high  words  ensued. 

"  The  company  took  their  drink,  however,  all  but  Mr.  Carneal,  who 
went  out  upon  the  bow  of  the  boat,  and  took  a  seat,  where  he  was 
sought  by  Judge  James,  who  desired  satisfaction  for  the  insult.  Car 
neal  refused  to  make  any,  and  asked  the  old  gentleman  if  any  of  hia 
sons  would  resent  the  insult  if  he  was  to  slap  him  in  the  mouth ;  to  which 
the  judge  replied  that  he  would  do  it  himself,  if  his  sons  would  not ; 
whereupon  Mr.  Carneal  struck  him  in  the  mouth  with  the  back  of  his 
hand.  The  judge  resented  it  by  striking  him  across  the  head  with  a 
cane,  which  stunned  Mr.  Carneal  very  much,  causing  the  blood  to  run 
freely  from  the  wound.  As  soon  as  Carneal  recovered  from  the  wound, 
he  drew  a  bowie-knife,  and  attacked  the  judge  with  it,  inflicting  several 
wounds  upon  his  person,  some  of  which  were  thought  to  be  mortal. 

"  Some  gentlemen,  in  endeavoring  to  separate  the  combatants,  were 
Wounded  by  Carneal.  When  Judge  James  arrived  at  his  house,  bleed 
ing,  and  in  a  dying  state,  as  was  thought,  his  son  seized  a  double-bar 
relled  gun,  loaded  it  heavily  with  large  shot,  galloped  to  where  the  boat 
was,  hitched  his  horse,  and  deliberately  raised  his  gun  to  shoot  Car 
neal,  who  was  sitting  upon  a  cotton-bale.  Mr.  James  was  warned  not 
to  fire,  as  Carneal  was  unarmed,  and  he  might  kill  some  innocent  per 
son.  He  took  his  gun  from  his  shoulder,  raised  it  again,  and  fired  both 
barrels  in  succession,  killing  Carneal  instantly. 

"  It  is  a  sad  affair,  and  Carneal  leaves,  besides  numerous  friends,  a 
most  interesting  and  accomplished  widow,  to  bewail  his  tragical  end." 


58  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

which  they  used  on  the  subject  of  slavery,  afforded 
abundant  proof  that  the  gagging  system  which  had 
prevailed  so  long  in  Congress  had  come  at  last  to  an 
end. 

These  movements,  though  the  propositions  of 
Messrs.  Hale  and  Palfrey  were  voted  down,  were  not 
without  their  effect.  The  Common  Council  of 
Washington  appointed  an  acting  mayor,  in  place  of 
the  regular  mayor,  who  was  sick.  President  Polk 
sent  an  intimation  to  the  clerks  of  the  departments, 
some  of  whom  had  been  active  in  the  mobs,  that 
they  had  better  mind  their  own  business  and  stay  at 
home.  Something  was  said  about  marines  from  the 
Navy- Yard;  and  from  that  time  the  riotous  spirit 
began  to  subside. 

Meanwhile,  the  unfortunate  people  who  had 
attempted  to  escape  in  the  Pearl  had  to  pay  the 
penalty  of  their  love  of  freedom.  A  large  number  of 
them,  as  they  were  taken  out  of  jail  by  the  persons 
who  claimed  to  be  their  owners,  were  handed  over 
to  the  slave-traders.  The  following  account  of  the 
departure  of  a  portion  of  these  victims  for  the  south 
ern  market  was  given  in  a  letter  which  appeared  at 
the  time  in  several  northern  newspapers  : 

"Washington,  April  22,  1848. 

"  Last  evening,  as  I  was  passing  the  railroad  depot,  1  saw 
a  large  number  of  colored  people  gathered  round  one  of  the 
cars,  and,  from  manifestations  of  grief  among  some  of  them, 
I  was  induced  to  draw  near  and  ascertain  the  cause  of  it. 
I  found  in  the  car  towards  which  they  were  so  eagerly  gaz 
ing  about  fifty  colored  people,  some  of  whom  were  nearly 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  59 

«. 

as  white  as  myself.  A  majority  of  them  were  of  the  num 
ber  who  attempted  to  gain  their  liberty  last  week.  About 
half  of  them  were  females,  a  few  of  whom  had  but  a  slight 
tinge  of  African  blood  in  their  veins,  and  were  finely  formed 
and  beautiful.  The  men  were  ironed  together,  and  the 
whole  group  looked  sad  and  dejected.  At  each  end  of  the 
car  stood  two  ruffianly-looking  personages,  with  large  canes 
in  their  hands,  and,  if  their  countenances  were  an  index  of 
their  hearts,  they  were  the  very  impersonation  of  hardened 
villany  itself. 

"  In  the  middle  of  the  car  stood  the  notorious  slave-dealer  of 
Baltimore,  Slatter,  who,  I  learn,  is  a  member  of  the  Methodist 
church,  *  in  good  and  regular  standing.'  He  had  purchased 
the  men  and  women  around  him,  and  was  taking  his  depart 
ure  for  Georgia.  While  observing  this  old,  gray-headed 
villain,  —  this  dealer  in  the  bodies  and  souls  of  men,  —  the 
chaplain  of  the  Senate  entered  the  car,  —  a  Methodist 
brother,  — and  took  his  brother  Slatter  by  the  hand,  chatted 
with  him  for  some  time,  and  seemed  to  view  the  heart 
rending  scene  before  him  with  as  little  concern  as  we  should 
look  upon  cattle.  I  know  not  whether  he  came  with  a  view 
to  sanctify  the  act,  and  pronounce  a  parting  blessing ;  but  this 
I  do  know,  that  he  justifies  slavery,  and  denounces  anti- 
slavery  efforts  as  bitterly  as  do  the  most  hardened  slave- 
dealers. 

"  A  Presbyterian  minister,  who  owned  one  of  the  fugitives, 
was  the  first  to  strike  a  bargain  with  Slatter,  and  make 
merchandise  of  God's  image  ;  and  many  of  these  poor  vic 
tims,  thus  manacled  and  destined  for  the  southern  market, 
are  regular  members  of  the  African  Methodist  church  of 
this  city.  I  did  not  hear  whether  they  were  permitted  to 
get  letters  of  dismission  from  the  church,  and  of  *  recom 
mendation  to  any  church  where  God,  in  his  providence, 


60  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

might  cast  their  lot.'  Probably  a  certificate  from  Slatter  to 
the  effect  that  they  are  Christians  will  answer  every  pur 
pose.  No  doubt  he  will  demand  a  good  price  for  slaves  of 
this  character.  Perhaps  brother  Slicer  furnished  him  with 
testimonials  of  their  religious  character,  to  help  their  sale  in 
Georgia.  I  understand  that  he  was  accustomed  to  preach  to 
them  here,  and  especially  to  urge  upon  them  obedience  to 
their  masters. 

"  Some  of  the  colored  people  outside,  as  well  as  in  the  car, 
were  weeping  most  bitterly.  I  learned  that  many  families 
were  separated.  Wives  were  there  to  take  leave  of  their 
husbands,  and  husbands  of  their  wives,  children  of  their 
parents,  brothers  and  sisters  shaking  hands  perhaps  for  the 
last  time,  friends  parting  with  friends,  and  the  tenderest  ties 
of  humanity  sundered  at  the  single  bid  of  the  inhuman 
slave-broker  before  them.  A  husband,  in  the  meridian  of 
life,  begged  to  see  the  partner  of  his  bosom.  He  protested 
that  she  was  free  —  that  she  had  free  papers,  and  was 
torn  from  him,  and  shut  up  in  the  jail.  He  clambered 
up  to  one  of  the  windows  of  the  car  to  see  his  wife,  and,  as 
she  was  reaching  forward  her  hand  to  him,  the  black 
hearted  villain,  Slatter,  ordered  him  down.  He  did  not 
obey.  The  husband  and  wife,  with  tears  streaming  down 
their  cheeks,  besought  him  to  let  them  converse  for  a  mo 
ment.  But  no  !  a  monster  more  hideous,  hardened  and 
savage,  than  the  blackest  spirit  of  the  pit,  knocked  him 
down  from  the  car,  and  ordered  him  away.  The  bystand 
ers  could  hardly  restrain  themselves  from  laying  violent 
hands  upon  the  brutes.  This  is  but  a  faint  description  of 
that  scene,  which  took  place  within  a  few  rods  of  the  capi- 
tol,  under  enactments  recognized  by  Congress.  O  !  what  a 
revolting  scene  to  a  feeling  heart,  and  what  a  retribution 
awaits  the  actors  !  Will  not  these  wailings  of  anguish 


OF     DANIEL    DKAYTON.  61 

reach  the  ears  of  the  Most  High  ?     '  Vengeance  is  mine  ;  I 
will  repay,  saith  the  Lord.'  " 

Of  those  sent  off  at  this  time,  several,  through  the 
generosity  of  charitable  persons  at  the  north,  were 
subsequently  redeemed,  among  whom  were  the  Ed- 
mundson  girls,  of  whom  an  account  is  given  in  the 
"  Key  to  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin." 

From  one  of  the  women,  who  was  not  sold,  but 
retained  at  Washington,  I  received  a  mark  of  kind 
ness  and  remembrance  for  which  I  felt  very  grateful. 
She  obtained  admission  to  the  jail,  the  Sunday  after 
our  committal,  to  see  some  of  her  late  fellow-pas 
sengers  still  confined  there ;  and,  as  she  passed  the 
passage  in  which  I  was  confined,  she  called  to  me 
and  handed  a  Bible  through  the  gratings.  I  am 
happy  to  be  able  to  add  that  she  has  since,  upon  a 
second  trial,  succeeded  in  effecting  her  escape,  and 
that  she  is  now  a  free  woman. 

The  great  excitement  which  our  attempt  at  eman 
cipation  had  produced  at  Washington,  and  the  rage 
and  fury  exhibited  against  us,  had  the  effect  to  draw 
attention  to  our  case,  and  to  secure  us  sympathy 
and  assistance  on  the  part  of  persons  wholly  un 
known  to  us.  A  public  meeting  was  held  in  Faneuil 
Hall,  in  Boston,  on  the  25th  of  April,  at  which  a 
committee  was  appointed,  consisting  of  Samuel  May, 
Samuel  G.  Howe,  Samuel  E.  Sewell,  Richard  Hil- 
dreth,  Robert  Morris,  Jr.,  Francis  Jackson,  Elizur 
Wright,  Joseph  Southwick,  Walter  Channing,  J.  W. 
Browne,  Henry  I.  Bowditch,  William  F.  Channing, 
6 


62  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

Joshua  P.  Blanchard  and  Charles  List,  authorized  to 
employ  counsel  and  to  collect  money  for  the  purpose 
of  securing  to  us  a  fair  trial,  of  which,  without  some 
interference  from  abroad,  the  existing  state  of  public 
feeling  in  the  District  of  Columbia  seemed  to  afford 
little  prospect.  A  correspondence  was  opened  by 
this  committee  with  the  Hon.  Horace  Mann,  then  a 
representative  in  Congress  from  the  State  of  Massa 
chusetts,  with  ex-Governor  Seward,  of  New  York, 
with  Salmon  P.  Chase,  Esq.,  of  Ohio,  and  with  Gen. 
Fessenden,  of  Maine,  all  of  whom  volunteered  their 
gratuitous  services,  should  they  be  needed.  A  mod 
erate  subscription  was  promptly  obtained,  the  larger 
part  of  it,  as  I  am  informed,  through  the  liberality 
of  Gerrit  Smith,  now  a  representative  in  Congress 
from  New  York,  whose  large  pecuniary  contribu 
tions  to  all  philanthropic  objects,  as  well  as  his  zeal 
ous  efforts  in  the  same  direction  both  with  the  tongue 
and  the  pen,  have  made  him  so  conspicuous.  He 
has,  indeed,  a  unique  way  of  spending  his  large  for 
tune,  without  precedent,  at  least  in  this  country,  and 
not  likely  to  find  many  imitators. 

The  committee,  being  thus  put  in  funds,  deputed 
Mr.  Hildreth,  one  of  the  members  of  it,  to  proceed  to 
Washington  to  make  the  necessary  arrangements. 
He  arrived  there  toward  the  end  of  the  month  of 
May,  by  which  time  the  public  excitement  against 
us,  or  at  least  the  exterior  signs  of  it,  had  a  good 
deal  subsided.  But  we  were  still  treated  with  much 
rigor,  being  kept  locked  up  in  our  cells,  denied  the 
use  of  the  passage,  and  not  allowed  to  see  anybody, 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  63 

except  when  once  in  a  while  Mr.  Giddings  or  Mr. 
Hall  found  an  access  to  us ;  but  even  then  we  were 
not  allowed  to  hold  any  conversation,  except  in  the 
presence  of  the  jailer. 

It  may  well  be  imagined  that  the  news  of  my  cap 
ture  and  imprisonment,  and  of  the  danger  in  which 
I  seemed  to  be,  had  thrown  my  family  into  great  dis 
tress.  I  also  had  suffered  exceedingly  on  their  account, 
several  of  the  children  being  yet  too  young  to  shift 
for  themselves.  But  I  was  presently  relieved,  by  the 
information  which  I  received  before  long,  that  during 
my  imprisonment  my  family  would  be  provided  for. 

Warm  remonstrances  had  been  made  to  the  judge 
of  the  criminal  court  by  Mr.  Hall  against  the  attempt 
to  exclude  us  from  communication  with  our  friends, 
—  a  liberty  freely  granted  to  all  other  prisoners. 
The  judge  declined  to  interfere  ;  but  Mr.  Mann,  hav 
ing  agreed  to  act  as  our  counsel,  was  thenceforth 
freely  admitted  to  interviews  with  us,  without  the 
presence  of  any  keeper.  Books  and  newspapers  were 
furnished  me  by  friends  out  of  doors.  I  presently 
obtained  a  mattress,  and  the  liberty  of  providing  my 
self  with  better  food  than  the  jail  allows.  I  contin 
ued  to  suifer  a  good  deal  of  annoyance  from  the 
capricious  insolence  and  tyranny  of  the  marshal, 
Robert  Wallace ;  but  I  intend  to  go  more  at  length 
into  the  details  of  my  prison  experience  after  having 
first  disposed  of  the  legal  proceedings  against  us. 

The  feeling  against  me  was  no  doubt  greatly 
increased  by  the  failure  of  the  efforts  repeatedly 
made  to  induce  me  to  give  up  the  names  of  those 


64  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

who  had  cooperated  with  me,  and  to  turn  states- 
evidence  against  them.  There  was  a  certain  Mr. 
Taylor,  from  Boston,  I  believe,  then  in  Washington, 
the  inventor  of  a  submarine  armor  for  diving  pur 
poses.  I  had  formerly  been  well  acquainted  with 
him,  and,  at  a  time  when  no  friend  of  mine  was 
allowed  access  to  me,  he  made  me  repeated  visits 
at  the  jail,  at  the  request,  as  he  said,  of  the  District 
Attorney,  to  induce  me  to  make  a  full  disclosure,  in 
which  case  it  was  intimated  I  should  be  let  off  very 
easy. 

As  Mr.  Taylor  did  not  prevail  with  me,  one  of  the 
jailers  afterwards  assured  me  that  he  was  authorized 
to  promise  me  a  thousand  dollars  in  case  I  would  be 
come  a  witness  against  those  concerned  with  me.  As 
I  turned  a  deaf  ear  to  all  these  propositions,  the  reso 
lution  seemed  to  be  taken  to  make  me  and  Sayres, 
and  even  English,  suffer  in  a  way  to  be  a  warning 
to  all  similar  offenders. 

The  laws  under  which  we  were  to  be  tried  were 
those  of  the  State  of  Maryland  as  they  stood  pre 
vious  to  the  year  1800.  These  laws  had  been  tem 
porarily  continued  in  force  over  that  part  of  the  Dis 
trict  ceded  by  Maryland  (the  whole  of  the  pres 
ent  District)  at  the  time  that  the  jurisdiction  of 
the  United  States  commenced ;  and  questions  of 
more  general  interest,  and  the  embarrassment  grow 
ing  out  of  the  existence  of  slavery,  having  defeated 
all  attempts  at  a  revised  code,  these  same  old  laws 
of  Maryland  still  remain  in  force,  though  modified, 
in  some  respects,  by  acts  of  Congress.  In  an  act  of 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  65 

Maryland,  passed  in  the  year  1796,  and  in  force  in 
the  District,  there  was  a  section  which  seemed  to 
have  been  intended  for  precisely  such  cases  as  ours. 
It  provided  "  That  any  person  or  persons  who  shall 
hereafter  be  convicted  of  giving  a  pass  to  any  slave, 
or  person  held  to  service,  or  shall  be  found  to  assist, 
by  advice,  donation  or  loan,  or  otherwise,  the  trans 
porting  of  any  slave  or  any  person  held  to  service, 
from  this  state,  or  by  any  other  unlawful  means 
depriving  a  master  or  owner  of  the  service  of  his 
slave  or  person  held  to  service,  for  every  such 
offence  the  party  aggrieved  shall  recover  damages  in 
an  action  on  the  case,  against  such  offender  or  offend 
ers,  and  such  offender  or  offenders  shall  also  be 
liable,  upon  indictment,  and  conviction  upon  verdict, 
confession  or  otherwise,  in  this  state,  in  any  county 
court  where  such  offence  shall  happen,  to  be  fined  a 
sum  not  exceeding  two  hundred  dollars,  at  the  dis 
cretion  of  the  court,  one-half  to  the  use  of  the  master 
or  owner  of  such  slave,  the  other  half  to  the  county 
school,  if  there  be  any ;  if  there  be  no  such  school,  to 
the  use  of  the  county." 

Accordingly,  the  grand  jury,  under  the  instructions 
of  the  District  Attorney,  found  seventy-four  indict 
ments  against  each  of  us  prisoners,  based  on  this  act, 
one  for  each  of  the  slaves  found  on  board  the  vessel, 
two  excepted,  who  were  runaways  from  Virginia, 
and  the  names  of  their  masters  not  known.  As  it 
would  have  been  possible  to  have  fined  us  about 
fifteen  thousand  dollars  apiece  upon  these  indict 
ments,  besides  costs,  and  as,  by  the  laws  of  the  Dis- 
6* 


66  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

trict,  there  is  no  method  of  discharging  prisoners 
from  jail  who  are  unable  to  pay  a  fine,  except  by  an 
executive  pardon,  one  would  have  thought  that  this 
might  have  satisfied.  But  the  idea  that  we  should 
escape  with  a  fine,  though  we  might  be  kept  in 
prison  for  life  from  inability  to  pay  it,  was  very 
unsatisfactory.  It  was  desired  to  make  us  out 
guilty  of  a  penitentiary  offence  at  the  least ;  and  for 
that  purpose  recourse  was  had  to  an  old,  forgotten 
act  of  Maryland,  passed  in  the  year  1737,  the  fourth 
section  of  which  provided  "  That  any  person  or  per 
sons  who,  after  the  said  tenth  day  of  September 
[1737],  shall  steal  any  ship,  sloop,  or  other  vessel 
whatsoever,  out  of  any  place  within  the  body  of 
any  county  within  this  province,  of  seventeen  feet 
or  upwards  by  the  keel,  and  shall  carry  the  same 
ten  miles  or  upwards  from  the  place  whence  it  shall 
be  stolen,  or  who  shall  steal  any  negro  or  other  slave, 
or  who  shall  counsel,  hire,  aid,  abet,  or  command 
any  person  or  persons  to  commit  the  said  offences,  or 
who  shall  be  accessories  to  the  said  offences,  and 
shall  be  thereof  legally  convicted  as  aforesaid,  or 
outlawed,  or  who  shall  obstinately  or  of  malice  stand 
mute,  or  peremptorily  challenge  above  twenty,  shall 
suffer  death  as  a  felon,  or  felons,  and  be  excluded 
the  benefit  of  the  clergy." 

They  would  have  been  delighted,  no  doubt,  to 
hang  us  under  this  act ;  but  that  they  could  not  do, 
as  Congress,  by  an  act  passed  in  1831,  having 
changed  the  punishment  of  death,  inflicted  by  the 
old  Maryland  statutes  (except  in  certain  cases  spec- 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  67 

ially  provided  for),  into  confinement  in  the  peniten 
tiary  for  not  less  than  twenty  years. 

To  make  sure  of  us  at  all  events,  not  less  than 
forty-one  separate  indictments  (that  being  the  num 
ber  of  the  pretended  owners)  were  found  against  each 
of  us  for  stealing  slaves. 

Our  counsel  afterwards  made  some  complaint  of 
this  great  number  of  indictments,  when  two  against 
each  of  us,  including  all  the  separate  charges  in  dif 
ferent  counts,  would  have  answered  as  well.  It  was 
even  suggested  that  the  fact  that  a  fee  of  ten  dollars 
was  chargeable  upon  each  indictment  toward  the 
five-thousand-dollar  salary  of  the  District  Attorney 
might  have  something  to  do  with  this  large  number. 
But  the  District  Attorney  denied  very  strenuously 
being  influenced  by  any  such  motive,  maintaining,  in 
the  face  of  authorities  produced  against  him,  that 
this  great  number  was  necessary.  He  thought  it 
safest,  I  suppose,  instead  of  a  single  jury  on  each 
charge  against  each  of  us,  to  have  the  chance  of  a 
much  greater  number,  and  the  advantage,  besides, 
of  repeated  opportunities  of  correcting  such  blunders, 
mistakes  and  neglects,  as  the  prisoner's  counsel  might 
point  out. 

On  the  6th  of  July,  I  was  arraigned  in  the  crim 
inal  court,  Judge  Crawford  presiding,  on  one  of  the 
larceny  indictments,  to  which  I  pleaded  not  guilty ; 
whereupon  my  counsel,  Messrs.  Hall  and  Mann, 
moved  the  court  for  a  continuance  till  the  next  term, 
alleging  the  prevailing  public  excitement,  and  the 
want  of  time  to  prepare  the  defence  and  tp  procure 


68  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

additional  counsel.  But  the  judge  could  only  be  per 
suaded,  and  that  with  difficulty,  to  delay  the  trial  for 
eighteen  days. 

When  this  unexpected  information  was  communi 
cated  to  the  committee  at  Boston,  a  correspondence 
was  opened  by  telegraph  with  Messrs.  Seward, 
Chase  and  Fessenden.  But  Governor  Seward  had  a 
legal  engagement  at  Baltimore  on  the  very  day 
appointed  for  the  commencement  of  the  trial,  and  the 
other  two  gentlemen  had  indispensable  engagements 
in  the  courts  of  Ohio  and  Maine.  Under  these  cir 
cumstances,  as  Mr.  Hall  was  not  willing  to  take  the 
responsibility  of  acting  as  counsel  in  the  case,  and  as 
it  seemed  necessary  to  have  some  one  familiar  with 
the  local  practice,  the  Boston  committee  retained  the 
services  of  J.  M.  Carlisle,  Esq.,  of  the  Washington 
bar,  and  Mr.  Hildreth  again  proceeded  to  Washing 
ton  to  give  his  assistance.  Just  as  the  trial  was 
about  to  commence,  Mr.  Carlisle  being  taken  sick, 
the  judge  was,  with  great  difficulty,  prevailed  upon 
to  grant  a  further  delay  of  three  days.  This  delay 
was  very  warmly  opposed,  not  only  by  the  District 
Attorney,  but  by  the  same  Mr.  Radcliff  whom  we 
have  seen  figuring  as  chairman  of  the  mob-commit 
tee  to  wait  on  Dr.  Bailey,  and  who  had  been  retained, 
at  an  expense  of  two  hundred  dollars,  by  the  friends 
of  English,  as  counsel  for  him,  they  thinking  it  saf 
est  not  to  have  his  defence  mixed  up  in  any  way 
with  that  of  myself  and  Sayres.  Before  the  three 
days  were  out,  Governor  Seward,  having  finished 
his  business  in  Baltimore,  hastened  to  Washington  ; 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  69 

but,  as  the  rules  of  the  court  did  not  allow  more  than 
two  counsel  to  speak  on  one  side,  the  other  counsel 
being  also  fully  prepared,  it  was  judged  best  to  pro 
ceed  as  had  been  arranged. 

The  trials  accordingly  commenced  on  Thursday, 
the  27th  of  July,  upon  an  indictment  against  me  for 
stealing  two  slaves,  the  property  of  one  Andrew 
Houver. 

The  District  Attorney,  in  opening  his  case,  which 
he  did  in  a  very  dogmatic,  overbearing  and  violent 
manner,  declared  that  this  was  no  common  affair. 
The  rights  of  property  were  violated  by  every  lar 
ceny,  but  this  case  was  peculiar  and  enormous. 
Other  kinds  of  property  were  protected  by  their  want 
of  intelligence ;  but  the  intelligence  of  this  kind  of 
property  greatly  diminished  the  security  of  its  pos 
session.  The  jury  therefore  were  to  give  such  a 
construction  to  the  laws  and  the  facts  as  to  subject 
violators  of  it  to  the  most  serious  consequences. 

The  facts  which  seemed  to  be  relied  upon  by  the 
District  Attorney  as  establishing  the  alleged  larceny 
were  —  that  I  had  come  to  Washington,  and  staid 
from  Monday  to  Saturday,  without  any  ostensible 
business,  when  I  had  sailed  away  with  seventy-six 
slaves  on  board,  concealed  under  the  hatches,  and 
the  hatches  battened  down  ;  and  that  when  pursued 
and  overtaken  the  slaves  were  found  on  board  with 
provisions  enough  for  a  month. 

It  is  true  that  Houver  swore  that  the  hatches  were 
battened  down  when  the  Pearl  was  overtaken  by  the 
steamer ;  but  in  this  he  was  contradicted  by  every 


70  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 


other  government  witness.  This  Houver  was,  ac 
cording  to  some  of  the  other  witnesses,  in  a  consider 
able  state  of  excitement,  and  at  the  time  of  the  cap 
ture  he  addressed  some  violent  language  to  me,  as 
already  related.  He  had  sold  his  two  boys,  after 
their  recapture,  to  the  slave-traders ;  but  had  been 
obliged  to  buy  them  back  again,  at  a  loss  of  one 
hundred  dollars,  by  the  remonstrances  of  his  wife, 
who  did  not  like  to  part  with  them,  as  they  had 
been  raised  in  the  family.  Perhaps  this  circum 
stance  made  him  the  more  inveterate  against  me. 

As  to  the  schooner  being  provisioned  for  a  month, 
the  bill  of  the  provisions  on  board,  purchased  in  Wash 
ington,  was  produced  on  the  trial,  and  they  were 
found  to  amount  to  three  bushels  of  meal,  two  hun 
dred  and  six  pounds  of  pork,  and  fifteen  gallons  of 
molasses,  which,  with  a  barrel  of  bread,  purchased 
in  Alexandria,  would  make  rather  a  short  month's 
supply  for  seventy-nine  persons  ! 

It  was  also  proved,  by  the  government  witnesses, 
that  the  Pearl  was  a  mere  bay-craft,  not  fit  to  go  to 
sea ;  which  did  not  agree  very  well  with  the  idea 
held  out  by  the  District  Attorney,  that  I  intended  to 
run  these  negroes  off  to  the  West  Indies,  and  to  sell 
them  there.  But,  to  make  up  for  these  deficiencies, 
Williams,  who  acted  as  the  leader  of  the  steamer 
expedition,  swore  that  I  had  said,  while  on  board, 
that  if  I  had  got  off  with  the  negroes  I  should  have 
made  an  independent  fortune;  but  on  the  next  trial  he 
could  not  say  whether  it  was  I  who  told  him  so,  or 
whether  somebody  else  told  him  that  I  had  said  so. 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  71 

Orme  and  Craig,  with  whom  I  principally  conversed, 
and  who  went  into  long  details,  recollected  nothing 
of  the  sort ;  and  it  is  very  certain  that,  as  there  was 
no  foundation  for  it,  and  no  motive  for  such  a  state 
ment  on  my  part,  I  never  made  it.  Williams,  per 
haps,  had  heard  somebody  guess  that,  if  I  had  got 
off,  I  had  slaves  enough  to  make  me  independent ; 
and  that  guess  of  somebody  else  he  perhaps  remem 
bered,  or  seemed  to  remember,  as  something  said  by 
me,  or  reported  to  have  been  said  by  me ;  and  such 
often,  in  cases  producing  great  public  excitement,  is 
the  sort  of  evidence  upon  which  men's  lives  or  liberty 
is  sworn  away.  The  idea,  however,  of  an  intention 
to  run  the  negroes  off  for  sale,  seemed  principally  to 
rest  on  the  testimony  of  a  certain  Captain  Baker,  who 
had  navigated  the  steamer  by  which  we  were  cap 
tured  at  the  mouth  of  the  Potomac,  and  who  saw,  as 
he  was  crossing  over  to  Coan  river  for  wood,  a  long, 
black,  suspicious-looking  brig,  with  her  sails  loose, 
lying  at  anchor  under  Point  Lookout,  about  three 
miles  from  our  vessel.  This  was  proved,  by  other 
witnesses,  to  be  a  very  common  place  of  anchorage  ; 
in  fact,  that  it  was  common  for  vessels  waiting  for 
the  wind,  or  otherwise,  to  anchor  anywhere  along 
the  shores  of  the  bay.  But  Captain  Baker  thought 
otherwise ;  and  he  and  the  District  Attorney  wished 
the  jury  to  infer  that  this  brig  seen  by  him  under 
Point  Lookout  was  a  piratical  craft,  lying  ready  to 
receive  the  negroes  on  board,  and  to  carry  them  off  to 
Cuba ! 

Besides  Houver,  Williams,  Orme,  Craig  and  Baker, 


72  PERSONAL   MEMOIR 

another  witness  was  called  to  testify  as  to  the  sale  of 
the  wood,  and  my  having  been  in  Washington  the 
previous  summer.  Many  questions  as  to  evidence 
arose,  and  the  examination  of  these  witnesses  con 
sumed  about  two  days  and  a  half. 

In  opening  the  defence,  Mr.  Mann  commenced 
with  some  remarks  on  the  peculiarity  of  his  position, 
growing  out  of  the  unexpected  urgency  with  which 
the  case  had  been  pushed  to  a  trial,  and  the  public 
excitement  which  had  been  produced  by  it.  He  also 
alluded  to  the  hardship  of  rinding  against  me  such  a 
multiplicity  of  indictments, —  for  what  individual, 
however  innocent,  could  stand  up  against  such  an 
accumulated  series  of  prosecutions,  backed  by  all  the 
force  of  the  nation  ?  Some  observations  on  the  costs 
thus  unnecessarily  accumulated,  and,  in  particular, 
on  the  District  Attorney's  ten-dollar  fees,  produced  a 
great  excitement,  and  loud  denials  on  the  part  of  that 
officer. 

Mr.  Mann  then  proceeded  to  remark  that,  in  all 
criminal  trials  which  he  had  ever  before  attended  or 
heard  of,  the  prosecuting  officer  had  stated  and  pro 
duced  to  the  jury,  in  his  opening,  the  law  alleged  to 
be  violated.  As  the  District  Attorney  had  done 
nothing  of  that  sort,  he  must  endeavor  to  do  it  for 
him.  Mr.  Mann  then  proceeded  to  call  the  attention 
of  the  jury  to  the  two  laws  already  quoted,  upon 
which  the  two  sets  of  indictments  were  founded.  Of 
both  these  acts  charged  against  me  —  the  stealing  of 
Houver's  slaves,  and  the  helping  them  to  escape 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  73 

from  their  master  —  I  could  not  be  guilty.  The  real 
question  in  this  case  was,  Which  had  I  done  ? 

To  make  the  act  stealing,  there  must  have  been 
—  so  Mr.  Mann  maintained  —  a  taking  lucri  causa^ 
as  the  lawyers  say ;  that  is,  a  design  on  my  part  to 
appropriate  these  slaves  to  my  own  use,  as  my  own 
property.  If  the  object  was  merely  to  help  them  to 
escape  to  a  free  state,  then  the  case  plainly  came 
under  the  other  statute. 

In  going  on  to  show  how  likely  it  was  that  the 
persons  on  board  the  Pearl  might  have  desired  and 
sought  to  escape,  independently  of  any  solicitations 
or  suggestions  on  my  part,  Mr.  Mann  alluded  to  the 
meeting  in  honor  of  the  French  revolution,  already 
mentioned,  held  the  very  night  of  the  arrival  of  the 
Pearl  at  Washington.  As  he  was  proceeding  to  read 
certain  extracts  from  the  speech  of  Senator  Foote  on 
that  occasion,  already  quoted,  and  well  calculated, 
as  he  suggested,  to  put  ideas  of  freedom  and  emanci 
pation  into  the  heads  of  the  slaves,  he  was  suddenly 
interrupted  by  the  judge,  when  the  follow  ing  curious 
dialogue  occurred  : 

"  Judge  Crawford. —  A  certain  latitude  is  to  be  allowed  to 
counsel  in  this  case;  but  I  cannot  permit  any  harangue 
against  slavery  to  be  delivered  here. 

"  Carlisle  (rising  suddenly  and  stepping  forward).  —  I  am 
sure  your  honor  must  be  laboring  under  some  strange  mis 
apprehension.  Born  and  bred  and  expecting  to  live  and 
die  in  a  slave-holding  community,  and  entertaining  no  ideas 
different  from  those  which  commonly  prevail  here,  I  have 
watched  the  course  of  my  associate's  argument  with  the 
7 


74  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

closest  attention.  The  point  he  is  making-,  I  am  sure,  is 
most  pertinent  to  the  case,  —  a  point  it  would  be  cowardice 
in  the  prisoner's  counsel  not  to  make  ;  and  I  must  beg  your 
honor  to  deliberate  well  before  you  undertake  to  stop  the 
mouths  of  counsel,  and  to  take  care  that  you  have  full  con 
stitutional  warrant  for  doing  so. 

"Judge  Crawford.  —  I  can't  permit  an  harangue  against 
slavery." 

Mr.  Mann  proceeded  to  explain  the  point  at  which 
he  was  aiming.  He  had  read  these  extracts  from 
Mr.  Foote's  speech,  delivered  to  a  miscellaneous  col 
lection  of  blacks  and  whites,  bond  and  free,  assem 
bled  before  the  Union  office,  as  showing  to  what 
exciting  influences  the  slaves  of  the  District  were 
exposed,  independently  of  any  particular  pains  taken 
by  anybody  to  make  them  discontented ;  and,  with 
the  same  object  in  view,  he  proposed  to  read  some 
further  extracts  from  other  speeches  delivered  on  the 
same  occasion. 

"  District  Attorney. —  If  this  matter  is  put  in  as  evidence, 
it  must  first  be  proved  that  such  speeches  were  delivered. 

"  Mann.  — If  the  authenticity  of  the  speeches  is  denied, 
I  will  call  the  Honorable  Mr.  Foote  to  prove  it. 

"  District  Attorney. —  What  newspaper  is  that  from  which 
the  counsel  reads  ? 

"  Mann  (holding  it  up).  —  The  Washington  Union,  of 
April  19th." 

And,  without  further  objection,  he  proceeded  to  read 
some  further  extracts. 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  75 

He  concluded  by  urging  upon  the  jury  that  this 
case  was  to  be  viewed  merely  as  an  attempt  of  cer 
tain  slaves  to  escape  from  their  masters,  and  on  my 
part  an  attempt  to  assist  them  in  so  doing;  and 
therefore  a  case  under  the  statute  of  1796,  punish 
able  with  fine ;  and  not  a  larceny,  as  charged  against 
me  in  this  indictment. 

Several  witnesses  were  called  who  had  known  me 
in  Philadelphia,  to  testify  as  to  my  good  character. 
The  District  Attorney  was  very  anxious  to  get  out 
of  these  witnesses  whether  they  had  never  heard  me 
spoken  of  as  a  man  likely  to  run  away  with  slaves  ? 
And  it  did  come  out  from  one  of  them  that,  from  the 
tenor  of  my  conversation,  it  used  sometimes  to  be 
talked  over,  that  one  day  or  other  it  "  would  heave 
up  "  that  I  had  helped  off  some  negro  to  a  free  state. 
But  these  conversations,  the  witness  added,  were 
generally  in  a  jesting  tone ;  and  another  witness 
stated  that  the  charge  of  running  off  slaves  was  a 
common  joke  among  the  watermen. 

According  to  the  practice  in  the  Maryland  crim 
inal  courts, —  and  the  same  practice  prevails  in  the 
District  of  Columbia, —  the  judge  does  not  address 
the  jury  at  all.  After  the  evidence  is  all  in,  the 
counsel,  before  arguing  the  case,  may  call  upon  the 
judge  to  give  to  the  jury  instructions  as  to  the  law. 
These  instructions,  which  are  offered  in  writing,  and 
argued  by  the  counsel,  the  judge  can  give  or  refuse, 
as  he  sees  fit,  or  can  alter  them  to  suit  himself;  but 
any  such  refusal  or  alteration  furnishes  ground  for  a 
bill  of  exceptions,  on  which  the  case,  if  a  verdict  is 


76  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

given  against  the  prisoner,  may  be  carried  by  writ 
of  error  before  the  Circuit  Court  of  the  District,  for 
their  revisal. 

My  counsel  asked  of  the  judge  no  less  than  four 
teen  instructions  on  different  points  of  law,  ten  of 
which  the  judge  refused  to  give,  and  modified  to  suit 
himself.  Several  of  these  related  to  the  true  defi 
nition  of  theft,  or  what  it  was  that  makes  a  taking 
larceny. 

It  was  contended  by  my  counsel,  and  they  asked 
the  judge  to  instruct  the  jury,  that,  to  convict  me  of 
larceny,  it  must  be  proved  that  the  taking  the 
slaves  on  board  the  Pearl  was  with  the  intent  to 
convert  them  to  my  own  use,  and  to  derive  a  gain 
from  such  conversion ;  and  that,  if  they  believed  that 
the  slaves  were  received  on  board  with  the  design  to 
help  them  to  escape  to  a  free  state,  then  the  offence 
was  not  larceny,  but  a  violation  of  the  statute  of 
1796. 

This  instruction,  variously  put,  was  six  times  over 
asked  of  the  judge,  and  as  often  refused.  He  was 
no  less  anxious  than  the  District  Attorney  to  con 
vict  me  of  larceny,  and  send  me  to  the  penitentiary. 
But,  having  a  vast  deal  more  sense  than  the  District 
Attorney,  he  saw  that  the  idea  that  I  had  carried  off 
these  negroes  to  sell  them  again  for  my  own  profit 
was  not  tenable.  It  was  plain  enough  that  my  in 
tention  was  to  help  them  to  escape.  The  judge 
therefore,  who  did  not  lack  ingenuity,  went  to  work 
to  twist  the  law  so  as,  if  possible,  to  bring  my  case 
within  it.  Even  he  did  not  venture  to  say  that 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  77 

merely  to  assist  slaves  to  escape  was  stealing.  Steal 
ing,  he  admitted,  must  be  a  taking,  lucri  causa,  for 
the  sake  of  gain ;  but  —  so  he  told  the  jury  in  one  of 
his  instructions — "  this  desire  of  gain  need  not  be  to 
convert  the  article  taken  to  his  —  the  taker' s  —  own 
use,  nor  to  obtain  for  the  thief  the  value  in  money 
of  the  thing  stolen.  If  the  act  was  prompted  by  a 
desire  to  obtain  for  himself,  or  another  even,  other 
than  the  owner,  a  money  gain,  or  any  other  inducing 
advantage,  a  dishonest  gain,  then  the  act  was  a 
larceny."  And,  in  another  instruction,  he  told  the 
jury,  "  that  if  they  believed,  from  the  evidence,  that 
the  prisoner,  before  receiving  the  slaves  on  board, 
imbued  their  minds  with  discontent,  persuaded  them 
to  go  with  him,  and,  by  corrupt  influences  and 
inducements,  caused  them  to  come  to  his  ship,  and 
then  took  and  carried  them  down  the  river,  then  the 
act  was  a  larceny." 

Upon  these  instructions  of  the  judge,  to  which  bills 
of  exceptions  were  filed  by  my  counsel,  the  case, 
which  had  been  already  near  a  week  on  trial,  was 
argued  to  the  jury.  The  District  Attorney  had  the 
opening  and  the  close,  and  both  my  counsel  had  the 
privilege  of  speaking.  For  the  following  sketch  of 
the  argument,  as  well  as  of  the  legal  points  already 
noted,  I  am  indebted  to  the  notes  of  Mr.  Hildreth, 
taken  at  the  time  : 

"  District  Attorney. — I  shall  endeavor  to  be  very  brief 
in  the  opening,  reserving  myself  till  I  know  the  grounds 
of  defence.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  jury  to  give  their  verdict 

7* 


78  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

according  to  the  law  and  evidence  ;  and,  so  far  as  I  knew 
public  opinion,  there  neither  exists  now,  nor  has  existed 
at  any  other  time,  the  slightest  desire  on  the  part  of  a  single 
individual  that  the  prisoner  should  have  otherwise  than  a 
fair  trial.  I  think,  therefore,  the  solemn  warnings  by 
the  prisoner's  counsel  to  the  jury  were  wholly  uncalled  for. 
There  was,  no  doubt,  an  excitement  out  of  doors,  —  a  natural 
excitement,  —  at  such  an  amount  of  property  snatched 
up  at  one  fell  swoop ;  but  was  that  to  justify  the  sugges 
tion  to  a  jury  of  twelve  honest  men  that  they  were  not  to 
act  the  part  of  a  mob  ?  The  learned  counsel  who  opened 
the  case  for  the  prisoner  has  alluded  to  the  disadvantage 
of  his  position  from  the  fact  that  he  was  a  stranger.  I 
acknowledge  that  disadvantage,  and  I  have  attempted  to 
remedy  it,  and  so  has  the  court,  by  extending  towards  him 
every  possible  courtesy. 

"  The  prisoner's  counsel  seems  to  think  I  press  this  matter 
too  hard.  But  am  I  to  sit  coolly  by  and  see  the  hard-earned 
property  of  the  inhabitants  of  this  District  carried  off,  and 
when  the  felon  is  brought  into  court  not  do  my  best  to 
secure  his  conviction  ?  [The  District  Attorney  here  went 
into  a  long  and  labored  defence  of  the  course  he  had  taken 
in  preferring  against  the  prisoner  forty-one  indictments  for 
larceny,  and  seventy-four  others,  on  the  same  state  of  facts, 
for  transportation.  He  denied  that  the  forty-one  larcenies 
of  the  property  of  different  individuals  could  be  included  in 
one  indictment,  and  declared  that  if  the  prisoner's  counsel 
would  show  the  slightest  authority  for  it  he  would  give  up 
the  case.  After  going  on  in  this  strain  for  an  hour  or  more, 
attacking  the  opposite  counsel  and  defending  himself,  in 
what  Carlisle  pronounced  *  the  most  extraordinary  opening 
argument  he  had  ever  h^rd  in  his  life,'  the  District 
Attorney  came  down  at  las-  •  *v-^  facts  of  the  case.] 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  79 

"In  what  position  is  the  prisoner  placed  by  the  evidence  ? 
How  is  he  introduced  to  the  jury  by  his  Philadelphia 
friends?  These  witnesses  were  examined  as  to  his  char 
acter,  and  the  substance  of  their  testimony  is,  that  he  is  a 
man  who  would  steal  a  negro  if  he  got  a  chance.  He 
passed  for  honest  otherwise.  But  he  says  himself  he  would 
steal  a  negro  to  liberate  him,  and  the  court  says  it  makes 
no  difference  whether  he  steals  to  liberate  or  steals  to  sell. 
Being  caught  in  the  act,  he  acknowledges  his  guilt,  and 
says  he  was  a  deserter  from  his  God,  —  a  backslider,  —  a 
church-member  one  year  —  the  next,  in  the  Potomac  with  a 
schooner,  stealing  seventy-four  negroes !  Why  say  he 
took  them  for  gain,  if  he  did  not  steal  them  ?  Why  say  he 
knew  he  should  end  his  days  in  a  penitentiary  ?  Why  say 
if  he  got  off  with  the  negroes  he  should  have  realized  an 
independent  fortune  ?  Did  he  not  know  they  were  slaves  ? 
He  chartered  the  vessel  to  carry  off  negroes ;  and,  if  they 
were  free  negroes,  or  he  supposed  them  to  be,  how  was  he 
to  realize  an  independent  fortune  ?  He  was  afraid  of  the 
excitement  at  Washington.  Why  so,  if  the  negroes  were 
not  slaves  ?  There  was  the  fact  of  their  being  under  the 
hatches,  concealed  in  the  hold  of  the  vessel,  —  did  not  that 
prove  he  meant  Jo  steal  them  ?  Add  to  that  the  other  fact 
of  his  leaving  at  night.  He  comes  here  with  a  miserable 
load  of  wood  ;  gives  it  away ;  sells  it  for  a  note ;  did  not 
care  about  the  wood,  wanted  only  to  get  it  out ;  had  a  long 
ing  for  a  cargo  of  negroes.  The  wood  was  a  blind ;  besides 
he  lied  about  it ;  — would  he  have  ever  come  back  to  collect 
his  note  ?  But  the  prisoner's  counsel  says  the  slaves  might 
have  heard  Mr.  Foote's  torch-light  oration,  and  so  have 
been  persuaded  to  go.  A  likely  story  !  They  all  started 
off,  I  suppose,  ran  straight  down  to  the  vessel  and  got 
into  the  hol4)  Seventy-four  negroes  all  together!  But 


80  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

was  not  the  vessel  chartered  in  Philadelphia  to  carry  off 
negroes  ?  This  shows  the  excessive  weakness  of  the 
defence.  And  how  did  the  slaves  behave  after  they  were 
captured  ?  If  they  had  been  running  away,  would  they  not 
have  been  downcast  and  disheartened  ?  Would  not  they 
have  said,  Now  we  are  taken  ?  On  the  other  hand, 
according  to  the  testimony  of  Major  Williams,  on  their  way 
back  they  were  laughing,  shouting  and  eating  molasses  in 
large  quantities.  Nero  fiddled  when  Rome  was  burning, 
but  did  not  eat  molasses.  What  a  transition,  from  liberty  to 
molasses  ! 

"  Then  it  is  proved  that  the  bulkhead  between  the  cabin 
and  the  hold  was  knocked  down,  and  that  the  slaves  went 
to  Drayton  and  asked  if  they  should  fight.  Did  not  that 
show  his  authority  over  them,  —  that  the  slaves  were  under 
his  control,  and  that  he  was  the  master-spirit  ?  It  speaks 
volumes.  [Here  followed  a  long  eulogy  on  the  gallantry 
and  humanity  of  the  thirty-five  captors.  One  man  did 
threaten  a  little,  but  he  was  drunk.] 

"  The  substance  of  the  law,  as  laid  down  by  the  judge,  is 
this  :  If  Drayton  came  here  to  carry  off  these  people,  and, 
by  machinations,  prevailed  on  them  to  go  with  him,  and 
knew  they  were  slaves,  it  makes  no  difference  whether  he 
took  them  to  liberate,  or  took  them  to  sell.  If  he  was  to 
be  paid  for  carrying  them  away,  that  was  gain  enough.  Sup 
pose  a  man  were  to  take  it  into  his  head  that  the  northern 
factories  were  very  bad  things  for  the  health  of  the  factory- 
girls,  and  were  to  go  with  a  schooner  for  the  purpose  of 
liberating  those  poor  devils  by  stealing  the  spindles,  would 
not  he  be  served  as  this  prisoner  is  served  here  ?  Would 
they  not  exhaust  the  law-books  to  find  the  severest  punish 
ment  ?  There  may  be  thcise  carried  so  far  by  a  miserable 
mistaken  philanthropy  as  even  to  steal  slaves  for  the  sake 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  81 

of  setting  them  at  liberty.  But  this  prisoner  says  he  did  it 
for  gain.  We  might  look  upon  him  with  some  respect  if, 
in  a  manly  style,  he  insisted  on  his  right  to  liberate  them. 
But  he  avowedly  steals  for  gain.  He  lies  about  it,  besides. 
Even  a  jury  of  abolitionists  would  have  no  sympathy  for 
such  a  man.  Try  him  anyhow,  by  the  word  of  God  —  by 
the  rules  of  common  honesty —  he  would  be  convicted,  any 
how.  He  is  presented  to  the  world  at  large  as  a  rogue  and 
a  common  thief  and  liar.  There  can  be  no  other  conception 
of  him.  He  did  it  for  dishonest  gain. 

"  The  prisoner  must  be  convicted:  He  cannot  escape. 
There  can  be  no  manner  of  doubt  as  to  his  guilt.  I  am  at 
a  loss,  without  appearing  absurd  in  my  own  eyes,  to  con 
ceive  what  kind  of  a  defence  can  be  made.  fft  ' 

"  I  have  not  the  least  sort  of  feeling  against  the  wretch 
himself,  —  I  desire  a  conviction  from  principle.  I  have 
heard  doctrines  asserted  on  this  trial  that  strike  directly  at 
the  rights  and  liberty  of  southern  citizens.  I  have  heard 
counsel  seeking  to  establish  principles  that  strike  directly  at 
the  security  of  southern  property.  I  feel  no  desire  that  this 
man,  as  a  man,  should  be  convicted;  but  I  do  desire  that  all 
persons  inclined  to  infringe  on  our  rights  of  property  should 
know  that  there  is  a  law  here  to  punish  them,  and  I  am 
happy  that  the  law  has  been  so  clearly  laid  down  by  the 
court.  Let  it  be  known  from  Maine  to  Texas,  to  earth's 
widest  limits,  that  we  have  officers  and  juries  to  execute 
that  law,  no  matter  by  whom  it  may  be  violated  ! 

"Mann  —  for  the  prisoner  —  regretted  to  occupy  any 
more  of  the  jury's  time  with  this  very  protracted  trial. 
I  mentioned,  some  days  since,  that  the  prisoner  was 
liable,  under  the  indictments  against  him,  to  eight  hundred 
years  imprisonment,  —  a  term  hardly  to  be  served  out  by 
Methuselah  himself;  but,  apart  from  any  punishment,  if 


82  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

his  hundred  and  twenty-five  trials  are  to  proceed  at  this 
rate,  the  chance  is  he  will  die  without  ever  reaching 
their  termination.  The  District  Attorney  has  dwelt  at  great 
length  on  what  passed  the  other  day,  and  more  than  once  he 
has  pointedly  referred  to  me,  in  a  tone  and  manner  not  to 
be  mistaken.  I  have  endeavored  to  conduct  this  trial 
according  to  the  principles  of  law,  and  to  that  standard  I 
mean  to  come  up.  My  client,  though  a  prisoner  at  this  bar, 
has  rights,  legal,  social,  human  ;  and  upon  those  rights  I 
mean  to  insist.  This  is  the  first  time  in  my  life  that  I  ever 
heard  a  prisoner  on  trial,  and  before  conviction,  denounced 
as  a  liar,  a  thief,  a  felon,  a  wretch,  a  rogue.  It  is  unjust  to 
apply  these  terms  to  any  man  on  trial.  The  law  presumes 
him  to  be  innocent.  The  feelings  of  the  prisoner  ought  not 
to  be  thus  outraged.  He  is  unfortunate;  he  may  be  guilty; 
that  is  the  very  point  you  are  to  try. 

"  This  prisoner  is  charged  with  stealing  two  slaves,  the 
property  of  Andrew  Houver.  Did  he,  or  not  ?  That  point 
you  are  to  try  by  the  law  and  the  evidence.  Because  you 
may  esteem  this  a  peculiarly  valuable  kind  of  property,  you 
are  not  to  measure  out  in  this  case  a  peculiar  kind  of  jus 
tice.  You  have  heard  the  evidence ;  the  law  for  the  pur 
poses  of  this  trial  you  are  to  take  from  the  judge.  But  you 
are  not  to  be  led  away  with  the  idea  that  you  must  convict 
this  prisoner  at  any  rate.  It  is  a  well-established  principle 
that  it  is  better  for  an  indefinite  number  of  guilty  men  to 
escape  than  for  one  innocent  man  to  be  convicted  and  pun 
ished  ;  and  for  the  best  of  reasons,  —  for  to  have  the  very 
machinery  established  for  the  protection  of  right  turned  into 
an  instrument  for  the  infliction  of  wrong,  strikes  a  more 
fatal  blow  at  civil  society  than  any  number  of  unpunished 
private  injuries. 

"  Nor  is  there  any  danger  that  the  prisoner  will  escape  due 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  83 

punishment  for  any  crimes  he  may  have  committed.  Be 
sides  this  and  forty  other  larceny  indictments  hanging  over 
his  head,  there  are  seventy-four  transportation  indictments 
against  him.  Now,  he  cannot  be  guilty  of  both  ;  and  which 
of  these  offences,  if  either,  does  the  evidence  against  him 
prove  ? 

"  Who  is  this  man  ?  Look  at  him  !  You  see  he  has 
passed  the  meridian  of  life.  You  have  heard  about  him 
from  his  neighbors.  They  pronounce  him  a  fair,  upright, 
moral  man.  No  suspicion  hitherto  was  ever  breathed 
against  his  honesty.  He  was  a  professor  of  religion,  and, 
so  far  as  we  know,  had  walked  in  all  the  ordinances  and 
commands  of  the  law  blameless.  Now,  in  all  cases  of 
doubt,  a  fair  and  exemplary  character,  especially  in  an 
elderly  man,  is  a  great  capital  to  begin  with.  This  prisoner 
may  have  been  mistaken  in  his  views  as  to  matters  of 
human  right ;  but,  as  to  violating  what  he  believed  to  be 
duty,  there  is  not  the  slightest  evidence  that  such  was  his 
character,  but  abundance  to  the  contrary.  He  is  found 
under  circumstances  that  make  him  amenable  to  the  law ;  let 
him  be  tried, —  I  do  not  gainsay  that ;  but  let  him  have  the 
common  sentiments  of  humanity  extended  toward  him,  even 
if  he  be  guilty. 

"  The  point  urged  against  him  with  such  earnestness  —  I 
may  say  vehemence  —  is,  not  that  he  took  the  slaves 
merely,  but  that  he  took  them  with  design  to  steal.  His 
confessions  are  dwelt  upon,  stated  and  overstated,  as  you 
will  recollect.  But  consider  under  what  circumstances  these 
alleged  confessions  were  made.  There  are  circumstances 
which  make  such  statements  very  fallacious.  Consider  his 
excitement  —  his  state  of  health  ;  for  it  is  in  evidence  that 
he  had  been  out  of  health,  suffering  with  some  disorder 
which  required  his  head  to  be  shaved.  Consider  the  armed 


84  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

men  that  surrounded  him,  and  the  imminent  peril  in  which 
he  believed  his  life  to  be.  It  is  great  injustice  to  brand 
him  with  the  foul  epithet  of  liar  for  any  little  discrepancies, 
if  such  there  were,  in  statements  made  under  such  circum 
stances.  Other  matters  have  been  forced  in,  of  a  most  ex 
traordinary  character,  to  prejudice  his  case  in  your  eyes. 
It  has  been  suggested  —  the  idea  has  been  thrown  out,  again 
and  again  —  that,  under  pretence  of  helping  them  to  free 
dom,  he  meant  to  sell  these  negroes.  This  suggestion, 
which  outruns  all  reason  and  discretion,  is  founded  on  the 
simple  fact  of  a  brig  seen  lying  at  anchor  in  a  place  of  com 
mon  anchorage,  suggesting  no  suspicious  appearance,  but  as 
to  which  you  are  asked  to  infer  that  these  seventy-six 
slaves  were  to  be  transported  into  her,  and  carried  to  Cuba 
or  elsewhere  for  sale.  What  a  monstrous  imagination  ! 
What  a  gross  libel  on  that  brig,  her  officers,  her  crew,  her 
owners,  all  of  whom  are  thus  charged  as  kidnappers  and 
pirates ;  and  all  this  baseless  dream  got  up  for  the  purpose 
of  influencing  your  minds  against  the  prisoner  !  It  marks, 
indeed,  with  many  other  things,  the  style  in  which  this 
prosecution  is  conducted. 

"  Take  the  law  as  laid  down  by  the  court,  and  it  is  neces 
sary  for  the  government  to  prove,  if  this  indictment  is  to  be 
sustained,  that  the  prisoner  corrupted  the  minds  of  Hou- 
ver's  slaves,  and  induced  and  persuaded  them  to  go  on  board 
his  vessel.  They  were  found  on  board  the  prisoner's  vessel, 
no  doubt ;  but  as  to  how  they  came  there  we  have  not  a  par 
ticle  of  evidence.  Here  is  a  gap,  a  fatal  gap,  in  the  govern 
ment's  case.  By  what  second-sight  are  you  to  look  into  this 
void  space  and  time,  and  to  say  that  Drayton  enticed  them 
to  go  on  board  ?  [The  counsel  here  read  from  1  Starkie  on 
Evidence,  510,  &c.,  to  the  effect  that  the  prosecution  are 
bound  by  the  evidence  to  exclude  every  hypothesis  incon- 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  85 

sistent  with  the  prisoner's  guilt.]  Now,  is  it  the  only  pos 
sible  means  of  accounting  for  the  presence  of  Houver's 
slaves  on  board  to  suppose  that  this  prisoner  enticed  them  ? 
Might  not  somebody  else  have  done  it  ?  Might  they  not 
have  gone  without  being  enticed  at  all  ?  We  wished  to 
call  the  slaves  themselves  as  witnesses,  but  the  law  shuts 
up  their  mouths.  Can  you,  without  any  evidence,  say  that 
Drayton  enticed  them,  and  that  by  no  other  means  could 
they  come  onboard  ?  Presumptive  evidence,  as  laid  down  in 
the  book  —  an  acknowledged  and  unquestioned  authority — 
from  which  I  have  read,  ought  to  be  equally  strong  with  the 
evidence  of  one  unimpeached  witness  swearing  positively  to 
the  fact.  Are  you  as  sure  that  Drayton  enticed  those  slaves 
as  if  that  fact  had  been  positively  sworn  to  by  one  wit 
ness,  testifying  that  he  stood  by  and  saw  and  heard  it  ?  If 
you  are  not,  then,  under  the  law  as  laid  down  by  the  court, 
you  can  not  find  him  guilty. 

"  Thursday,  Aug.  13. 

"  Carlisle,  for  the  prisoner.  —  The  sun  under  which  we 
draw  our  breath,  the  soil  we  tottle  over  in  childhood,  the 
air  we  breathe,  the  objects  that  earliest  attract  our  attention, 
the  whole  system  of  things  with  which  our  youth  is 
surrounded,  impress  firmly  upon  us  ideas  and  sentiments 
which  cling  to  us  to  our  latest  breath,  and  modify  all  our 
views.  I  trust  I  am  man  enough  always  to  remember 
this,  when  I  hear  opinions  expressed  and  views  maintained 
by  men  educated  under  a  system  different  from  that  pre 
vailing  here,  no  matter  how  contrary  those  views  and  opin 
ions  may  be  to  my  own. 

"It  may  surprise  those  of  you  who  know  me, —  the  moral 

atmosphere  in  which  I  have  grown  up,  and   the   opinions 

which  I  entertain, —  but  never  have  I  felt  so  deep  and  hearty 

an  interest  in  the  defence  of  any  case  as  in  this.     This 

8 


86  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

prisoner  I  never  saw  till  I  came  from  a  sick  bed  into  this 
court,  when  I  met  him  for  the  first  time.  I  had  participated 
strongly  in  the  feeling  which  in  connection  with  him  had 
been  excited  in  this  community.  As  you  well  know,  I  have 
and  could  have  no  sympathy  with  the  motives  by  which  he 
may  be  presumed  to  have  been  actuated.  Why,  then,  this 
sudden  feeling  in  his  behalf?  Not,  I  assure  you,  from  mer 
cenary  motives.  His  acquittal  or  his  condemnation  will 
make  no  difference  in  the  compensation  I  receive  for  my 
services.  The  overpowering  interest  I  feel  in  this  case 
originates  in  the  fact  that  it  places  at  stake  the  reputation 
of  this  District,  and,  in  some  respects,  of  the  country  itself,  of 
which  this  city  is  the  political  capital.  The  counsel  for  the 
government  has  dwelt  with  emphasis  on  the  great  amount 
and  value  of  property  placed  at  hazard  by  this  prisoner. 
There  is  something,  however,  far  more  valuable  than  prop 
erty  —  a  fair,  honorable,  impartial  administration  of  justice  ; 
and  of  the  chivalrous  race  of  the  south  it  may  be  expected 
that  they  will  do  justice,  though  the  heavens  fall !  God 
forbid  that  the  world  should  point  to  this  trial  as  a  proof 
that  we  are  so  besotted  by  passion  and  interest  that  we  can 
not  discern  the  most  obvious  distinctions  and  that  on  a 
slave  question  with  a  jury  of  slave-holders  there  is  no  pos 
sible  chance  of  justice !  Many,  I  assure  you,  will  be  ready 
to  fasten  this  charge  upon  us.  It  is  my  hope,  my  ardent 
desire,  it  is  your  sworn  duty,  that  no  step  be  taken  against 
this  prisoner  without  full  warrant  of  law  and  evidence. 
The  duty  of  defence  I  discharge  with  pleasure.  I  could 
have  desired  that  this  prisoner  might  have  been  defended 
entirely  by  counsel  resident  in  this  District.  It  would  have 
been  my  pride  to  have  shown  to  the  world  that  of  our  own 
mere  motion  we  would  do  justice  in  any  case,  no  matter 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  87 

how  delicate,  no  matter  how  sore  the  point  the  prisoner  had 
touched. 

"  My  learned  friend,  the  District  Attorney,  has  alluded 
to  the  courtesy  which  he  and  the  court  have  extended  to  my 
associate  in  this  cause.  I  hope  he  does  not  plume  himself 
upon  that.  A  gentleman  of  my  associate's  learning,  abil 
ity,  unexceptionable  deportment,  and  high  character  among 
his  own  people,  must  and  will  be  treated  with  courtesy 
wherever  he  goes.  But,  at  the  same  time  that  he  boasts 
of  his  courtesy,  the  District  Attorney  takes  occasion  to 
charge  my  associate  with  gross  ignorance  of  the  law.  He 
says  the  forty-one  charges  could  not  have  been  included  in 
one  indictment,  and  offers  to  give  up  the  case  if  we  will  pro 
duce  a  single  authority  to  that  effect.  It  were  easy  to  pro 
duce  the  authority  [see  1  Chitty,  C.  L.  Indictment],  but, 
unfortunately,  the  District  Attorney  has  made  a  promise 
which  he  can't  fulfil.  The  District  Attorney  is  mistaken  in 
this  matter;  at  the  same  time,  let  me  admit  that  in  the 
management  of  this  case  he  has  displayed  an  ability  be 
yond  his  years.  This  is  the  first  prosecution  ever  brought, 
so  far  as  we  can  discover,  on  this  slave-stealing  statute, 
either  in  this  District  or  in  Maryland.  This  statute,  of  the 
existence  of  which  few  lawyers  were  aware,  —  I  am  sure  I 
was  not,  —  has  been  waked  up,  after  a  slumber  of  more  than 
a  century,  and  brought  to  bear  upon  my  client.  It  is  your 
duty  to  go  into  the  examination  of  this  novel  case  temper 
ately  and  carefully ;  to  take  care  that  no  man  and  no  court, 
upon  review  of  the  case,  shall  be  able  to  say  that  your 
verdict  is  not  warranted  by  the  evidence.  If  the  case  is 
made  out  against  the  prisoner,  convict  him ;  but  if  not,  as 
you  value  the  reputation  of  the  District  and  your  own  souls, 
beware  how  you  give  a  verdict  against  him  ! 

"  You  are  not  a  lynch-law  court.  It  is  no  part  of  your  busi- 


88  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

ness  to  inquire  whether  the  prisoner  has  done  wrong,  and  if 
so  to  punish  him  for  it.  It  is  your  sole  business  to  inquire  if 
he  be  guilty  of  this  special  charge  set  forth  aga  inst  him  in  this 
indictment,  of  stealing  Andrew  Houver's  two  slaves.  The  law 
you  are  not  expected  to  judge  of;  to  enlighten  you  on  that 
matter,  we  have  prayed  instructions  from  the  court,  and  those 
instructions,  for  the  purpose  of  this  trial,  are  to  be  taken  as 
the  law.  The  question  for  you  is,  Does  the  evidence  in 
this  case  bring  the  prisoner  within  the  law  as  laid  down  by 
the  court  ?  To  bring  him  within  that  law,  you  are  not  to 
go  upon  imagination,  but  upon  facts  proved  by  witnesses  ; 
and,  it  seems  to  me,  you  have  a  very  plain  duty  before  you. 
This  is  not  a  thing  done  in  a  corner.  Take  care  that  you 
render  such  a  verdict  that  you  will  not  be  ashamed  to  have 
it  set  forth  in  letters  of  light,  visible  to  all  the  world. 

"  There  are  two  offences  established  by  the  statutes  of 
Maryland,  between  which,  in  this  case,  it  becomes  your 
duty  to  distinguish.  Everything  depends  on  these  statutes, 
because  without  these  statutes  neither  act  is  a  crime.  At 
common  law,  there  are  no  such  offences  as  stealing  slaves, 
or  transporting  slaves.  Now,  which  of  these  two  acts  is 
proved  against  this  prisoner  ?  In  some  respects  they  are 
alike.  The  carrying  the  slaves  away,  the  depriving  the 
master  of  their  services,  is  common  to  both.  But,  to  consti 
tute  the  stealing  of  slaves,  according  to  the  law  as  laid  down 
by  the  court,  there  must  be  something  more  yet.  There 
must  be  a  corruption  of  the  minds  of  the  slaves,  and  a 
seducing  them  to  leave  their  masters'  service.  And  does  not 
this  open  a  plain  path  for  this  prisoner  out  of  the  danger  of 
this  prosecution  ?  Where  is  the  least  evidence  that  the 
prisoner  seduced  these  slaves,  and  induced  them  to  leave 
their  masters  ?  Has  the  District  Attorney,  with  all  his 
zeal,  pointed  out  a  single  particle  of  evidence  of  that  sort  ? 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  89 

Has  he  done  anything  to  take  this  case  out  of  the  transport 
ation  statute,  and  to  convert  it  into  a  case  of  stealing  ?  He 
has,  to  be  sure,  indulged  in  some  very  harsh  epithets  ap 
plied  to  this  prisoner, — epithets  very  similar  to  those 
which  Lord  Coke  indulged  in  on  the  trial  of  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh,  and  which  drew  out  on  the  part  of  that  prisoner  a 
memorable  retort.  My  client  is  not  a  Raleigh  ;  but  neither, 
I  must  be  permitted  to  say,  is  the  District  Attorney  a  Lord 
Coke.  I  should  be  sorry  to  have  it  go  abroad  that  we  can 
not  try  a  man  for  an  offence  of  this  sort  without  calling 
him  a  liar,  a  rogue,  a  wretch.  [The  District  Attorney 
here  interrupted,  with  a  good  deal  of  warmth.  He  insisted 
that  he  did  not  address  the  prisoner,  but  the  jury,  and  that 
it  was  his  right  to  call  the  attention  of  the  jury  to  the  evi 
dence  proving  the  prisoner  to  be  a  liar,  rogue  and  wretch.] 
Carlisle  —  I  do  not  dispute  the  learned  gentleman's  right. 
It  is  a  matter  of  taste ;  but  with  you,  gentlemen  of  the 
jury,  these  harsh  epithets  are  not  to  make  the  difference  of 
a  hair.  You  are  to  look  at  the  evidence  ;  and  where  is  the 
evidence  that  the  prisoner  seduced  and  enticed  these 
slaves  ? 

"  It  may  happen  to  any  man  to  have  a  runaway  slave 
in  his  premises,  and  even  in  his  employment.  It  happened 
to  me  to  have  in  my  employ  a  runaway,  —  one  of  the  best 
servants,  by  the  way,  I  ever  had.  He  told  me  he  was  free, 
and  I  employed  him  as  such.  If  I  had  happened  to  have 
taken  him  to  Baltimore,  there  would  have  been  a  complete 
similitude  to  the  case  at  bar,  and,  according  to  the  Dis 
trict  Attorney's  logic,  I  might  have  been  indicted  for  steal 
ing.  Because  I  had  him  with  me,  I  am  to  be  presumed  to 
have  enticed  him  from  his  master !  As  to  the  particular  cir 
cumstances  under  which  he  came  into  my  employment,  I 
might  have  been  wholly  unable  to  show  them.  Is  it  not 


90  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

possible  to  suppose  a  great  number  of  circumstances  under 
which  these  slaves  of  Houver  left  their  master's  service  and 
came  on  board  the  Pearl,  without  any  agency  on  the  part 
of  this  prisoner  ?  Now,  the  government  might  positively 
disprove  and  exclude  forty  such  suppositions ;  but,  so  long 
as  one  remained  which  was  not  excluded,  you  cannot  find  a 
verdict  of  conviction.  The  government  is  to  prove  that  the 
prisoner  enticed  and  seduced  these  negroes,  and  you  have 
no  right  to  presume  he  did  so  unless  every  other  possible 
explanation  of  the  case  is  positively  excluded  by  the  testi 
mony.  Is  it  so  extravagant  a  supposition  that  Mr.  Foote's 
speech,  and  the  other  torch-light  speeches  heretofore  alluded 
to,  heard  by  these  slaves,  or  communicated  to  them,  might 
have  so  wrought  upon  their  minds  as  to  induce  them  to 
leave  their  masters  ?  I  don't  say  that  they  had  any  right 
to  suppose  that  these  declamations  about  universal  emanci 
pation  had  any  reference  to  them.  I  am  a  southern  man, 
and  I  hold  to  the  southern  doctrine.  I  admit  that  there  is 
no  inconsistency  between  perfect  civil  liberty  and  holding 
people  of  another  race  in  domestic  servitude.  But  then  it 
is  natural  that  these  people  should  overlook  this  distinction, 
however  obvious  and  important.  Nor  do  they  lack  wit  to 
apply  these  speeches  to  their  own  case  or  interest  in  such 
matters.  I  myself  have  a  slave  as  quick  to  see  distinctions 
as  I  am,  and  who  would  have  made  a  better  lawyer  if  he 
had  had  the  same  advantages.  It  came  out  the  other  day, 
in  a  trial  in  this  court,  that  the  colored  people  have  debat 
ing-societies  among  themselves.  It  was  an  assault  and 
battery  case  ;  one  of  the  disputants,  in  the  heat  of  the  argu 
ment,  struck  the  other ;  but  then  they  have  precedents  for 
that  in  the  House  of  Representatives.  Is  it  an  impossible, 
or  improbable,  or  a  disproved  supposition,  that  a  number  of 
slaves,  having  agreed  together  to  desert  their  masters,  or 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  91 

having  concerted  such  a  plan  with  somebody  here,  Drayton 
was  employed  to  come  and  take  them  away,  and  that  he 
received  them  on  board  without  ever  having  seen  one  of 
them  ?  If  his  confessions  are  to  be  taken  at  all,  they  are  to 
be  taken  together ;  and  do  they  not  tend  to  prove  such  a 
state  of  facts  ?  Drayton  says  he  was  hired  to  come  here, 
—  that  he  was  to  be  paid  for  taking  them  away.  Does 
that  look  as  if  he  seduced  them  ?  [The  counsel  here  com 
mented  at  length  on  Dray  ton's  statements,  for  the  purpose 
of  showing  that  they  tended  to  prove  nothing  more  than  a 
transportation  for  hire ;  and  he  threw  no  little  ridicule  on 
the  '  phantom  ship '  which  the  District  Attorney  had  con 
jured  up  in  his  opening  of  the  case,  but  which,  in  his  late 
speech,  he  had  wholly  overlooked.] 

"  But,  even  should  you  find  that  Drayton  seduced  these 
slaves  to  leave  their  masters,  to  make  out  a  case  of  larceny 
you  must  be  satisfied  that  he  took  them  into  his  possession. 
Now,  what  is  possession  of  a  slave  ?  Not  merely  being  in 
company  with  him.  If  I  ride  in  a  hack,  I  am  not  in  posses 
sion  of  the  driver.  Possession  of  a  slave  is  dominion  and 
control ;  and  where  is  the  slightest  evidence  that  this  pris 
oner  claimed  any  dominion  or  control  over  these  slaves  ? 
The  whole  question  in  this  case  is,  Were  these  slaves  stolen, 
or  were  they  running  away  with  the  prisoner's  assistance  ? 
The  mere  fact  of  their  being  in  the  prisoner's  company 
throws  no  light  whatever  on  this  matter. 

"  The  great  point,  however,  in  this  case  is  this,  —  By  the 
judge's  instructions,  enticement  must  be  proved.  Shall  the 
record  of  this  trial  go  forth  to  the  world  showing  that  you 
have  found  a  fact  of  which  there  was  no  evidence  ? 

"  I  believe  in  my  conscience  there  is  a  gap  in  this  evi 
dence  not  to  be  filled  up  except  by  passion  and  prejudice. 
If  that  is  so,  I  hope  there  is  no  one  so  ungenerous,  so  little 


92  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

of  a  true  southerner,  as  to  blame  me  for  my  zeal  in  this 
case,  or  not  to  rejoice  in  a  verdict  of  acquittal.  It  is  bad 
enough  that  strangers  should  have  got  up  a  mob  in  this 
District  in  relation  to  this  matter.  It  would,  however,  be  a 
million  times  worse  if  juries  cannot  be  found  here  cool 
and  dispassionate  enough  to  render  impartial  verdicts. 

"  District  Attorney.  —  I  hope,  gentlemen  of  the  jury,  you 
will  rise  above  all  out-of-door  influence.  Make  yourselves 
abolitionists,  if  you  can  ;  but  look  at  the  facts  of  the  case. 
And,  looking  at  those  facts,  is  it  necessary  for  me  to  open 
my  lips  in  reply  ?  In  a  case  like  this,  sustained  by  such 
direct  testimony,  such  overwhelming  proof,  I  defy  any  man, 
—  however  crazy  on  the  subject  of  slavery,  unless  he  be 
blinded  by  some  film  of  interest,  —  to  hesitate  a  moment  as 
to  his  conclusions.  [The  District  Attorney  here  proceeded 
at  great  length,  and  with  a  great  air  of  offended  dignity,  to 
complain  of  having  been  schooled  and  advised  by  the  pris 
oner's  counsel,  and  to  justify  the  use  of  the  foul  epithets 
he  had  bestowed  on  the  prisoner.]  This  is  not  a  place 
for  parlor  talk.  I  had  chosen  the  English  words  that  con 
veyed  my  meaning  most  distinctly.  It  was  all  very  well 
for  the  prisoner's  counsel  to  smooth  things  over ;  but  was  I, 
instead  of  calling  him  a  liar,  to  say,  he  told  a  fib  ?  When  I 
call  him  a  thief  and  a  felon,  do  I  go  beyond  the  charge  of 
the  grand  jury  in  the  indictment  ?  If  this  is  stepping  over 
the  limits  of  propriety,  in  all  similar  cases  I  shall  do  the 
same.  I  do  not  intend  to  blackguard  the  prisoner, —  I  do  not 
delight  in  using  these  epithets.  My  heart  is  not  locked  up  ; 
I  am  no  Jack  Ketch,  prosecuting  criminals  for  ten  dollars 
a  head.  I  sympathize  with  the  wretches  brought  here ;  but 
when  I  choose  to  call  them  by  tljeir  proper  names  I  am  not 
to  be  accused  of  bandying  epithets.  [The  District  Attorney 
then  proceeded  also  at  great  length,  and  in  a  high  key,  to 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  93 

justify  his  hundred  and  twenty-five  indictments  against  the 
prisoner,  and  to  clear  himself  from  the  imputation  of  mer 
cenary  motives,  on  the  ground  that  the  business  of  the  year, 
independently  of  these  indictments,  would  furnish  the  utmost 
amount  to  which  he  was  entitled.  He  next  referred  to  the 
matter  of  the  brig  testified  to  by  Captain  Baker,  which  had 
been  made  the  occasion  of  much  ridicule  by  the  prisoner's 
counsel.  Part  of  the  evidence  which  he  had  relied  on  in 
connection  with  the  brig  had  been  ruled  out ;  and  the  law,  as 
laid  down  by  the  court,  according  to  which  taking  to  liberate 
was  the  same  as  taking  to  steal,  had  made  it  unnecessary 
for  him,  so  he  said,  to  dwell  on  this  part  of  the  case.  Yet  he 
now  proceeded  to  argue  at  great  length,  from  the  testimony 
in  the  case,  that  there  must  have  been  a  connection  between 
the  brig  and  the  schooner  ;  that,  as  the  schooner  was  con 
fessedly  unseaworthy,  and  could  not  have  gone  out  of  the 
bay,  it  must  have  been  the  intention  to  put  the  slaves  on 
board  the  brig,  and  to  carry  them  off  to  Cuba  or  elsewhere 
and  sell  them.  The  testimony  to  this  effect  he  pronounced 
conclusive.] 

"The  United  States  (said  the  District  Attorney)  have 
laid  before  you  the  clearest  possible  case.  I  have  just  gone 
through  a  pretty  long  term  of  this  court ;  I  see  several  famil 
iar  faces  on  the  jury,  and  I  rely  on  your  intelligence.  In 
fact,  the  only  point  of  the  defence  is,  that  the  United  States 
have  offered  no  proof  that  Drayton  seduced  and  enticed 
these  slaves  to  come  on  board  the  Pearl ;  and .  that  the  pris 
oner's  counsel  are  pleased  to  call  a  gap,  a  chasm,  which 
they  say  you  can't  fill  up.  It  is  the  same  gap  which  occurs 
in  every  larceny  case.  Where  can  the  government  produce 
positive  testimony  to  the  taking?  That  is  done  secretly,  in 
the  dark,  and  is  to  be  presumed  from  circumstances.  A 
man  is  found  going  off  with  a  bag  of  chickens,  —  your  chick- 


94  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

ens.  Are  you  going  to  presume  that  the  chickens  run  into 
his  bag  of  their  own  accord,  and  without  his  agency  ?  A 
man  is  found  riding  your  horse.  Are  you  to  presume  that 
the  horse  came  to  him  of  its  own  accord  ?  and  yet  horses 
love  liberty,  —  they  love  to  kick  up  their  heels  and  run. 
Yet  this  would  be  just  as  sensible  as  to  suppose  that 
these  slaves  came  on  board  Dray  ton's  vessel  without  his 
direct  agency.  He  came  here  from  Philadelphia  for  them ; 
they  are  found  on  board  his  vessel ;  Drayton  says  he  would 
steal  a  negro  if  he  could ;  is  not  that  enough  ?  Then  he 
was  here  some  months  before  with  an  oyster-boat,  pretend 
ing  to  sell  oysters.  He  pretended  that  he  came  for  his  health. 
Likely  story,  indeed !  I  should  like  to  see  the  doctor 
who  would  recommend  a  patient  to  come  here  in  the  fall  of 
the  year,  when  the  fever  and  ague  is  so  thick  in  the  marshes 
that  you  can  cut  it  with  a  knife.  Cruising  about,  eating 
and  selling  oysters,  at  that  time  of  the  year,  for  his  health  ! 
Nonsense  !  He  was  here,  at  that  very  time,  hatching  and 
contriving  that  these  very  negroes  should  go  on  board  the 
Pearl.  But  the  prisoner's  counsel  say  he  might  have  been 
employed  by  others  simply  to  carry  them  away  !  Who 
could  have  employed  him  but  abolitionists;  and  did  he  not 
say  he  had  no  sympathy  with  abolitionists.  So  much  for 
that  hypothesis.  Then,  he  in  fact  pleads  guilty,  —  he  says 
he  expects  to  die  in  the  penitentiary.  Don't  you  think  he 
ought  to  ?  If  there  is  any  chasm  here,  the  prisoner  must 
shed  light  upon  it.  If  he  had  employers,  who  were  they  ? 
The  prisoner's  counsel  have  said  that  he  is  not  bound  to 
tell ;  and  that  the  witnesses,  if  summoned  here,  would  not  be 
compelled  to  criminate  themselves.  But  shall  this  prisoner 
be  allowed  to  take  advantage  of  his  own  wrong  ? 

"  As  to  the  metaphysics  of  the  prisoner's  counsel  about 
possession,  that  is   easily  disposed   of.      Were  not  these 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  95 

slaves  found  in  Drayton's  possession,  and  did  n't  he  admit 
that  he  took  them  ? 

"As  to  the  cautions  given  you  about  prejudice  and  pas 
sion,  I  do  not  think  they  are  necessary.  I  have  seen  no  scn*t 
of  excitement  here  since  the  first  detection  of  this  affair  that 
would  prevent  the  prisoner  having  a  fair  trial.  Is  there 
any  crowd  or  excitement  here  ?  The  community  will  be 
satisfied  with  the  verdict.  There  is  no  question  the  party 
is  guilty.  I  never  had  anything  to  do  with  a  case  sustained 
by  stronger  evidence.  I  don't  ask  you  to  give  an  illegal  or 
perjured  verdict.  Take  the  law  and  the  evidence,  and 
decide  upon  it. 

"  N.  B.  —  The  argument  being  now  concluded,  and  the 
jury  about  to  go  out,  some  question  arose  whether  the  jury 
should  have  the  written  instructions  of  the  court  with 
them  ;  and  some  inquiry  being  made  as  to  the  practice,  one 
of  the  jurors  observed  that  in  a  case  in  which  he  had  for 
merly  acted  as  juror  the  jury  had  the  instructions  with 
them,  and  he  proceeded  to  tell  a  funny  story  about  a  bottle 
of  rum,  told  by  one  of  the  jurors  on  that  occasion,  which 
story  caused  him  to  remember  the  fact.  It  may  be  observed, 
by  the  way,  that  the  proceedings  of  the  United  States  Crim 
inal  Court  for  the  District  of  Columbia  are  not  distinguished 
for  any  remarkable  decorum  or  dignity.  The  jury,  in  this 
case,  were  in  constant  intercourse,  during  any  little  inter 
vals  in  the  trial,  with  the  spectators  outside  the  bar." 

The  case  was  given  to  the  jury  about  three  o'clock, 
p.  M.,  and  the  court,  after  waiting  half  an  hour, 
adjourned. 

When  the  court  met,  at  ten  o'clock  the  next  morn 
ing,  the  jury  were  still  out,  having  remained  together 
all  night  without  being  able  to  agree.  Meanwhile 


96  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

the  District  Attorney  proceeded  to  try  me  on  another 
indictment,  for  stealing  three  slaves  the  property  of 
one  William  H.  Upperman.  As  this  trial  was  pro- 
ctSeding,  ahout  half-past  two  the  jury  in  the  first  case 
came  in,  and  rendered  a  verdict  of  GUILTY.  They 
presented  rather  a  haggard  appearance,  having  been 
locked  up  for  twenty -four  hours,  and  some  of  them 
being  perhaps  a  little  troubled  in  their  consciences. 
The  jury,  it  was  understood,  had  been  divided, 
from  the  beginning,  four  for  acquittal  and  eight  for 
conviction.  These  four  were  all  Irishmen,  and  per 
haps  they  did  not  consider  it  consistent  with  their 
personal  safety  and  business  interests  to  persist  in 
disappointing  the  slave-holding  public  of  that  verdict 
which  the  District  Attorney  had  so  imperiously 
demanded.  The  agreement,  it  was  understood,  had 
taken  place  only  a  few  moments  before  they  came  in, 
and  had  been  reached  entirely  on  the  strength  of 
Williams'  testimony  to  my  having  said,  that  had  I 
got  off  I  should  have  made  an  independent  fortune. 
Now,  it  was  a  curious  coincidence,  that  at  the  very  mo 
ment  that  this  agreement  was  thus  taking  place,  Wil 
liams,  again  on  the  stand  as  a  witness  on  the  second 
trial,  wished  to  take  back  what  he  had  then  sworn 
to  on  the  first  trial,  stating  that  he  could  not  tell 
whether  he  had  heard  me  say  this,  or  whether  he 
had  heard  of  my  having  said  it  from  somebody  else. 
After  the  rendition  of  the  verdict  of  the  other  jury, 
the  second  case  was  again  resumed.  The  evidence 
varied  in  only  a  few  particulars  from  that  which  had 
been  given  in  the  first  case.  There  was,  in  addition, 


OF    DANIEL     DRAYTON.  97 

the  testimony  of  Upperman,  the  pretended  owner  of 
the  woman  and  her  daughters,  one  of  fifteen,  the  other 
nine  years  old,  whom  I  was  charged  in  this  indict 
ment  with  stealing.  This  man  swore  with  no  less 
alacrity,  and  with  no  less  falsehood,  than  Houver  had 
done  before  him.  He  stated  that  about  half-past  ten, 
of  that  same  night  that  the  Pearl  left  Washington, 
while  he  was  fastening  up  his  house,  he  saw  a  man 
standing  on  the  side- walk  opposite  his  door,  and 
observed  him  for  some  time.  Not  long  after,  having 
gone  to  bed,  he  heard  a  noise  of  somebody  coming 
down  stairs;  and,  calling  out,  he  was  answered  by  his 
slave-woman,  who  was  just  then  going  off,  though 
he  had  no  suspicion  of  it  at  the  time.  That  man 
standing  on  the  sidewalk  he  pretended  to  recognize 
as  me.  He  was  perfectly  certain  of  it,  beyond  all 
doubt  and  question.  The  object  of  this  testimony 
was,  to  lead  to  a  conclusion  of  enticement  or  persua 
sion  on  my  part,  and  so  to  bring  the  case  within  one 
of  the  judge's  instructions  already  stated.  On  a  sub 
sequent  trial,  Upperman  was  still  more  certain,  if 
possible,  that  I  was  the  man.  But  he  was  entirely 
mistaken  in  saying  so.  His  house  was  on  Penn 
sylvania  Avenue,  more  than  a  mile  from  where 
the  Pearl  lay,  and  I  was  not  within  a  mile  of  it 
that  night.  I  dare  say  Upperman  was  sincere 
enough.  He  was  one  of  your  positive  sort  of  men ; 
but  his  case,  like  that  of  Houver,  shows  that  men 
in  a  passion  will  sometimes  fall  into  blunders.  I 
have  reason  to  believe  that  after  the  trials  were 
over  Upperman  became  satisfied  of  his  error. 
9 


98  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

The  first  trial  had  consumed  a  week ;  the  second 
one  lasted  four  days.  The  judge  laid  down  the  same 
law  as  before,  and  similar  exceptions  were  taken  by 
my  counsel.  The  jury  again  remained  out  all  night, 
being  long  divided,  —  nine  for  conviction  to  three 
for  acquittal ;  but  on  the  morning  of  August  9th  they 
came  in  with  a  verdict  of  GUILTY. 

Satisfied  for  the  present  with  these  two  verdicts 
against  me,  the  District  Attorney  now  proposed  to 
pass  over  the  rest  of  my  cases,  and  to  proceed  to  try 
Sayres.  My  counsel  objected  that,  having  been  forced 
to  proceed  against  my  remonstrances,  I  was  here 
ready  for  trial,  and  they  insisted  that  all  my  cases 
should  be  now  disposed  of.  They  did  not  prevail, 
however ;  and  the  District  Attorney  proceeded  to  try 
Sayres  on  an  indictment  for  stealing  the  same  two 
slaves  of  Houver. 

In  addition  to  the  former  witnesses  against  me, 
English  was  now  put  upon  the  stand,  the  District 
Attorney  having  first  entered  nolle  prosequi  upon  the 
hundred  and  fifteen  indictments  against  him.  But 
he  could  state  nothing  except  the  circumstances  of 
his  connection  with  the  affair,  and  the  coming  on 
board  of  the  passengers  on  Saturday  night,  as  I  have 
already  related  them.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
"  phantom  brig  "  story,  of  which  the  District  Attor 
ney  had  made  so  great  a  handle  in  the  two  cases 
against  me,  was  now  ruled  out,  on  the  ground  that 
the  brig  could  not  be  brought  into  the  case  till  some 
connection  had  first  been  shown  between  her  and  the 
Pearl.  The  trial  lasted  three  days.  The  District 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  99 

Attorney  pressed  for  a  conviction  with  no  less 
violence  than  he  had  done  in  my  case,  assuring  the 
jury  that  if  they  did  not  convict  there  was  an 
end  of  the  security  of  slave  property.  But  Sayres 
had  several  advantages  over  me.  My  two  juries  had 
been  citizens  of  Washington,  several  of  them  belong 
ing  to  a  class  of  loafers  who  frequent  the  courts  for 
the  sake  of  the  fees  to  be  got  as  jurymen.  Some 
complaints  having  been  made  of  this,  the  officers  had 
been  sent  to  Georgetown  and  the  country  districts, 
and  the  present  jury  was  drawn  from  those  quarters. 
Then,  again,  I  was  regarded  as  the  main  culprit,  — 
the  only  one  in  the  secret  of  the  transaction ;  and, 
as  I  was  already  convicted,  the  feeling  against 
Sayres  was  much  lessened.  In  fact,  the  jury  in  his 
case,  after  an  absence  of  half  an  hour,  returned  a 
verdict  of  NOT  GUILTY. 

The  District  Attorney,  greatly  surprised  and 
vexed,  proceeded  to  try  Sayres  on  another  indict 
ment.  This  trial  lasted  three  days  and  a  half;  but, 
in  spite  of  the  efforts  of  the  District  Attorney,  who 
was  more  positive,  longer  and  louder,  than  ever,  the 
jury,  in  ten  minutes,  returned  a  verdict  of  NOT  GUILTY. 

The  trials  had  now  continued  through  nearly  four 
weeks  of  very  hot  weather,  and  both  sides  were  pretty 
well  worn  out.  Vexed  at  the  two  last  verdicts,  the 
District  Attorney  threatened  to  give  up  Sayres  on  a 
requisition  from  Virginia,  which  was  said  to  have 
been  lodged  for  us,  some  of  the  alleged  slaves 
belonging  there,  and  we  having  been  there  shortly 
before. 


100  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

Finally,  it  was  agreed  that  verdicts  should  be 
taken  against  Sayres  in  the  seventy-four  transporta 
tion  cases,  he  to  have  the  advantage  of  carrying  the 
points  of  law  before  the  Circuit  Court,  and  the 
remaining  larceny  indictments  against  him  to  be 
discontinued. 

Thus  ended  the  first  legal  campaign.  English 
was  discharged  altogether,  without  trial.  Sayres 
had  got  rid  of  the  charge  of  larceny.  I  had  been 
found  guilty  on  two  indictments  for  stealing,  upon 
which  Judge  Crawford  sentenced  me  to  twenty  years 
imprisonment  in  the  penitentiary ;  while  Sayres,  on 
seventy-four  indictments  for  assisting  the  escape  of 
slaves,  was  sentenced  to  a  fine  on  each  indictment  of 
one  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  and  costs,  amounting 
altogether  to  seven  thousand  four  hundred  dollars. 
But  from  these  judgments  an  appeal  had  been  taken 
to  the  Circuit  Court,  and  meanwhile  Sayres  and 
I  remained  in  prison  as  before. 

The  hearing  before  the  Circuit  Court  came  on  the 
26th  of  November.  That  court  consisted  of  Chief- 
justice  Cranch,  an  able  and  upright  judge,  but  very 
old  and  infirm ;  and  Judges  Morrell  and  Dunlap,  the 
latter  of  whom  claimed  to  be  the  owner  of  two  of  the 
negroes  found  on  board  the  Pearl. 

My  cases  were  argued  for  me  by  Messrs.  Hildreth, 
Carlisle  and  Mann.  The  District  Attorney,  who 
was  much  better  fitted  to  bawl  to  a  jury  than  to 
argue  before  a  court,  had  retained,  at  the  expense  of 
the  United  States,  the  assistance  of  Mr.  Bradley,  one 
of  the  ablest  lawyers  of  the  District.  The  argument 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  101 

consumed  not  less  than  three  days.  Many  points 
were  discussed  ;  but  that  on  which  the  cases  turned 
was  the  definition  of  larceny.  It  resulted  in  the 
allowance  of  several  of  my  bills  of  exceptions,  the 
overturn  of  the  law  of  Judge  Crawford  on  the  sub 
ject  of  larceny,  and  the  establishment  by  the  Cir 
cuit  Court  of  the  doctrine  on  that  subject  contended 
for  by  my  counsel;  but  from  this  opinion  Judge 
Dunlap  dissented.  The  case  of  Sayres,  for  want  of 
time,  was  postponed  till  the  next  term. 

A  new  trial  having  been  ordered  in  my  two  cases, 
everybody  supposed  that  the  charge  of  larceny 
would  now  be  abandoned,  as  the  Circuit  Court  had 
taken  away  the  only  basis  on  which  it  could  possi 
bly  rest.  But  the  zeal  of  the  District  Attorney  was 
not  yet  satisfied ;  and,  no  longer  trusting  to  his  own 
unassisted  efforts,  he  obtained  (at  the  expense  of  the 
United  States)  the  assistance  of  Richard  Cox,  Esq., 
an  old  and  very  unscrupulous  practitioner,  with 
whose  aid  he  tried  the  cases  over  again  in  the  Crim 
inal  Court.  The  two  trials  lasted  about  fourteen 
days.  I  was  again  defended  by  Messrs.  Mann  and 
Carlisle,  and  now  with  better  success,  as  the  juries, 
under  the  instructions  which  Judge  Crawford  found 
himself  obliged  to  give,  and  notwithstanding  the 
desperate  efforts  against  me,  acquitted  me  in  both 
cases,  almost  without  leaving  their  seats. 

Finally,  the  District  Attorney  agreed  to  abandon 

the  remaining  larceny  cases,  if  we  would  consent  to 

verdicts  in  the   transportation   cases   on   the    same 

terms  with  those  in  the  case  of  Sayres.     This  was 

9* 


102  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

done  ;  when  Judge  Crawford  had  the  satisfaction  of 
sentencing  me  to  fines  and  costs  amounting  together 
to  ten  thousand  and  sixty  dollars,  and  to  remain  in 
prison  until  that  amount  was  paid. 

There  was  still  a  further  hearing  before  the  Circuit 
Court  on  the  bills  of  exceptions  to  these  transport 
ation  indictments.  My  counsel  thought  they  had 
some  good  legal  objections  ;  but  the  hearing  unfor 
tunately  came  on  when  Judge  Cranch  was  absent 
from  the  bench,  and  the  other  two  judges  overruled 
them.  By  a  strange  construction  of  the  laws,  no 
criminal  case,  except  by  accident,  can  be  carried 
before  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States;  oth 
erwise,  the  cases  against  us  would  have  been  taken 
there,  including  the  question  of  the  legality  of  slavery 
in  the  District  of  Columbia. 

Thus,  after  a  severe  and  expensive  struggle,  I  was 
saved  from  the  penitentiary ;  but  Sayres  and  myself 
remained  in  the  Washington  jail,  loaded  with  enor 
mous  fines,  which,  from  our  total  inability  to  pay 
them,  would  keep  us  there  for  life,  unless  the  Presi 
dent  could  be  induced  to  pardon  us;  and  it  was 
even  questioned,  as  I  shall  show  presently,  whether 
he  had  any  such  power. 

The  jail  of  the  District  of  Columbia  is  under  the 
charge  of  the  Marshal  of  the  District.  That  office, 
when  I  was  first  committed  to  prison,  was  filled  by 
a  Mr.  Hunter ;  but  he  was  sick  at  the  time,  and  died 
soon  after,  when  Robert  Wallace  was  appointed. 
This  Wallace  was  a  Virginian,  from  the  neighbor 
hood  of  Alexandria,  son  of  a  Doctor  Wallace  from 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  103 

whom  he  had  inherited  a  large  property,  including 
many  slaves.  He  had  removed  to  Tennessee,  and 
had  set  up  cotton-planting  there ;  but,  failing  in 
that  business,  had  returned  back  with  the  small 
remnants  of  his  property,  and  Polk  provided  for 
him  by  making  him  marshal.  It  was  not  long 
before  I  found  that  he  had  a  great  spite  against  me. 
It  was  in  vain  that  I  solicited  from  him  the  use  of 
the  passage.  The  light  which  came  into  my  cell  was 
very  faint,  and  I  could  only  read  by  sitting  on  the 
floor  with  my  back  against  the  grating  of  the  cell 
door.  But,  so  far  from  aiding  me  to  read, —  and 
it  was  the  only  method  I  had  of  passing  my  time, — 
Wallace  made  repeated  and  vexatious  attempts  to 
keep  me  from  receiving  newspapers.  I  should  very 
soon  have  died  on  the  prison  allowance.  The  mar 
shal  is  allowed  by  the  United  States  thirty-three 
cents  per  day  for  feeding  the  prisoners.  For  this 
money  they  receive  two  meals;  breakfast,  consisting 
of  one  herring,  corn-bread  and  a  dish  of  molasses 
and  water,  very  slightly  flavored  with  coffee ;  and 
for  dinner,  corn-bread  again,  with  half  a  pound  of 
the  meanest  sort  of  salted  beef,  and  a  soup  made  of 
corn-meal  stirred  into  the  pot-liquor.  This  is  the 
bill  of  fare  day  after  day,  all  the  year  round ;  and, 
as  at  the  utmost  such  food  cannot  cost  more  than 
eight  or  nine  cents  a  day  for  each  prisoner,  and  as 
the  average  number  is  fifty,  the  marshal  must  make 
a  handsome  profit.  The  diet  has  been  fixed,  I  sup 
pose,  after  the  model  of  the  slave  allowances.  But 
Congress,  after  providing  the  means  of  feeding  the 


104  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

prisoners  in  a  decent  manner,  ought  not  to  allow 
them  to  be  starved  for  the  benefit  of  the  marshal. 
Such  was  the  diet  to  which  I  was  confined  in  the 
first  days  of  my  imprisonment.  But  I  soon  contrived 
to  make  a  friend  of  Jake,  the  old  black  cook  of  the 
prison,  who,  I  could  see  as  he  came  in  to  pour  out 
my  coffee,  evinced  a  certain  sympathy  and  respect 
for  me.  Through  his  agency  I  was  able  to  purchase 
some  more  eatable  food ;  and  indeed  the  surgeon  of 
the  jail  allowed  me  flour,  under  the  name  of  medi 
cine,  it  being  impossible,  as  he  said,  for  me  to  live  on 
the  prison  diet.  Wallace,  soon  after  he  came  into 
office,  finding  a  small  sum  in  my  possession,  of 
about  forty  dollars,  took  it  from  me.  He  ex 
pressed  a  fear  that  I  might  corrupt  old  Jake,  or 
somebody  else,  —  especially  as  he  found  that  I  gave 
Jake  my  old  newspapers,  —  and  so  escape  from  the 
prison.  But  he  left  the  money  in  the  hands  of  the 
jailer,  and  allowed  me  to  draw  it  out,  a  dollar  at  a 
time.  He  presently  turned  out  old  Jake,  and  put  in  a 
slave-woman  of  his  own  as  cook ;  but  she  was  better 
disposed  towards  me  than  her  master,  and  I  found 
no  difficulty  in  purchasing  with  my  own  money, 
and  getting  her  to  prepare  such  food  as  I  wanted. 
I  was  able,  too,  after  some  six  or  eight  weeks' 
sleeping  on  the  stone  floor  of  my  cell,  to  obtain  some 
improvement  in  that  particular ;  and  not  for  myself 
only,  but  for  all  the  other  prisoners  also.  The  jailer 
was  requested  by  several  persons  who  came  to  see  us 
to  procure  mattresses  for  us  at  their  expense ;  and, 
finally,  Wallace,  as  if  out  of  pure  shame,  procured  a 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  105 

quantity  of  husk  mattresses  for  the  use  of  the  prison 
ers  generally.  Still,  we  had  no  cots,  and  were 
obliged  to  spread  our  mattresses  on  the  floor. 

The  allowance  of  clothing  made  to  the  prisoners 
who  were  confined  without  any  means  of  supporting 
themselves  corresponded  pretty  well  with  the  jail 
allowance  of  provisions.  They  received  shirts,  one 
at  a  time,  made  of  the  very  meanest  kind  of  cotton 
cloth,  and  of  the  very  smallest  dimensions ;  trousers 
of  about  equal  quality,  and  shoes.  It  was  said  that 
the  United  States  paid  also  for  jackets  and  caps. 
How  that  was  I  do  not  know ;  but  the  prisoners 
never  received  any. 

The  custody  of  the  jail  was  intrusted  to  a  head 
jailer,  assisted  by  four  guards,  or  turnkeys,  one  of 
whom  acted  also  as  book-keeper.  Of  the  personal 
treatment  toward  me  of  those  in  office,  at  the  time  I 
was  first  committed,  I  have  no  complaint  to  make. 
The  rigor  of  my  confinement  was  indeed  great ;  but 
I  am  happy  to  say  that  it  was  not  aggravated  by 
any  disposition  on  the  part  of  these  men  to  triumph 
over  me,  or  to  trample  upon  me.  As  they  grew  more 
acquainted  with  me,  they  showed  their  sense  that  I 
was  not  an  ordinary  criminal,  and  treated  me  with 
many  marks  of  consideration,  and  even  of  regard, 
and  in  one  of  them  I  found  a  true  friend. 

Shortly  after  Wallace  came  into  office,  he  made 
several  changes.  He  was  full  of  caprices,  and  easily 
took  offence  from  very  small  causes ;  and  of  this 
the  keepers,  as  well  as  the  prisoners,  had  abundant 
experience.  The  head  jailer  did  his  best  to  please, 


106  PERSONAL     MEMOIR 

behaving  in  the  most  humble  and  submissive  man 
ner  ;  but  all  to  no  purpose.  He  was  discharged,  as 
were  also  the  others,  one  after  another, —  Wallace 
undertaking  to  act  as  head  jailer  himself.  Of  Wal 
lace's  vexatious  conduct  towards  me;  of  his  refusal 
to  allow  me  to  receive  newspapers,  —  prohibiting  the 
under  jailer  to  lend  me  even  the  Baltimore  Sun  ;  of 
his  accusation  against  me  of  bribing  old  Jake,  whom 
he  forbade  the  turnkeys  to  allow  to  come  near  me  ; 
of  his  keeping  me  shut  up  in  my  cell ;  and  generally 
of  a  bitter  spirit  of  angry  malice  against  me, — I  had 
abundant  reason  to  complain  during  the  weary  fif 
teen  months  or  more  that  I  remained  under  his  power. 
But  his  subordinates,  though  obliged  to  obey  his 
orders  and  to  comply  with  his  humors,  were  far 
from  being  influenced  by  his  feelings.  Even  his 
favorite  among  the  turnkeys,  a  person  who  pretty 
faithfully  copied  his  conduct  towards  the  other  pris 
oners,  always  behaved  very  kindly  towards  me,  and 
even  used  to  make  a  confidant  of  me,  by  coming  to 
my  cell  to  talk  over  his  troubles. 

But  the  person  whose  kind  offices  and  friendly 
sympathy  did  far  more  than  those  of  any  other  to 
relieve  the  tediousness  of  my  confinement,  and  to 
keep  my  heart  from  sinking,  was  Mr.  Wood.  There 
is  no  chaplain  at  the  Washington  jail,  nor  has  Con 
gress,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  made  any  provision  of 
any  kind  for  the  spiritual  wants  or  the  moral  and 
religious  instruction  of  the  inmates  of  it.  This  great 
deficiency  Mr.  Wood,  a  man  of  a  great  heart,  though 
of  very  limited  pecuniary  means,  being  then  a  clerk 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  107 

in  the  Telegraph  office,  had  taken  it  upon  himself  to 
supply,  so  far  as  he  could ;  and  for  that  purpose  he 
was  in  the  habit  of  visiting  the  prison  on  Sundays, 
conversing  with  the  prisoners,  and  furnishing  tracts 
and  books  to  such  as  were  able  and  disposed  to  read. 
He  came  to  my  cell,  or  to  the  grating  of  the  passage 
in  which  I  was  confined,  on  the  very  first  Sunday  of 
my  imprisonment,  and  he  readily  promised,  at  my 
request,  to  furnish  me  with  a  Bible  ;  though  in  that 
act  of  kindness  he  was  anticipated  by  the  colored 
woman  of  whom  I  have  already  made  mention,  who 
appeared  at  my  cell,  with  a  Bible  for  me,  just  after 
Mr.  Wood  had  left  it. 

The  kindness  of  Mr.  Wood's  heart,  and  the  sincer 
ity  of  his  sympathy,  was  so  apparent  as  to  secure 
him  the  affectionate  respect  of  all  the  prisoners.  To 
me  he  proved  a  very  considerate  and  useful  friend. 
Not  only  was  I  greatly  indebted  to  his  assistance  in 
making  known  my  necessities  and  those  of  my  fam 
ily  to  those  disposed  to  relieve  them,  but  his  cheer 
ful  and  Christian  conversation  served  to  brighten 
many  a  dark  hour,  and  to  dispel  many  gloomy  feel 
ings.  Were  all  professing  Christians  like  my  friend 
Mr.  Wood,  we  should  not  hear  so  many  denuncia 
tions  as  we  now  do  of  the  church,  and  complaints 
of  her  short-comings. 

There  was  another  person,  also,  whose  kind  atten 
tions  to  me  I  ought  not  to  overlook.  This  was  Mrs. 
Susannah  Ford,  a  very  respectable  colored  woman, 
who  sold  refreshments  in  the  lobby  of  the  court-house, 
and  who,  in  the  progress  of  the  trial,  had  evinced 


108  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

a  good  deal  of  interest  in  the  case.  As  she  often  had 
boarders  in  the  jail,  who,  like  me,  could  not  live  on 
the  jail  fare,  and  whom  she  supplied,  she  was 
frequently  there,  and  she  seldom  came  without 
bringing  with  her  some  substantial  token  of  her 
regard. 

Sayres  and  myself  had  looked  forward  to  the 
change  of  administration,  which  resulted  from  the 
election  of  General  Taylor,  with  considerable  hopes 
of  advantage  from  it  —  but,  for  a  considerable  time, 
this  advantage  was  limited  to  a  change  in  the  mar 
shal  in  whose  custody  we  were.  The  turning  out 
of  Wallace  gave  great  satisfaction  to  everybody  in 
the  jail,  or  connected  with  it,  except  the  turnkeys, 
who  held  office  by  his  appointment,  and  who  ex 
pected  that  his  dismissal  would  be  followed  by  their 
own.  The  very  day  before  the  appointment  of  his 
successor  came  out,  I  had  been  remonstrating  with 
him  against  the  cruelty  of  refusing  me  the  use  of  the 
passage ;  and  I  had  even  ventured  to  hint  that  I  hoped 
he  would  do  nothing  which  he  would  be  ashamed  to 
see  spoken  of  in  the  public  prints;  to  which  he 
replied,  "  G — d  d — n  the  public  prints !  —  in  that  cell 
you  will  stay  !  "  But  in  this  he  proved  not  much  of  a 
prophet.  The  next  day,  as  soon  as  the  news  of  his 
dismissal  reached  the  jail,  the  turnkeys  at  once 
unlocked  my  cell-door  and  admitted  me  into  the  pas 
sage,  observing  that  the  new  marshal,  when  he 
came  to  take  possession,  should  at  least  find  me 
there. 

This  new  marshal  was  Mr.   Robert  Wallach,  a 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  109 

native  of  the  District,  very  similar  in  name  to  his 
predecessor,  but  very  different  in  nature ;  and  from 
the  time  that  he  entered  into  office  the  extreme 
rigor  hitherto  exercised  to  me  was  a  good  deal 
abated.  One  thing,  however,  I  had  to  regret  in  the 
change,  which  was  the  turning  out  of  all  the  old 
guards,  with  whom  I  was  already  well  acquainted, 
and  the  appointment  of  a  new  set.  One  of  these 
thus  turned  out  —  the  person  to  whom  I  have 
already  referred  to  as  the  chief  favorite  of  the  late 
marshal — made  a  desperate  effort  to  retain  his  office. 
But,  although  he  solicited  and  obtained  certificates 
to  the  effect  that  he  was,  and  always  had  been,  a 
good  Whig,  he  had  to  walk  out  with  the  others. 

The  new  jailer  appointed  by  Wallach,  and  three 
of  the  new  guards,  or  turnkeys,  were  very  gentle 
manly  persons,  and  neither  I  nor  the  other  pris 
oners  had  any  reason  to  complain  of  the  change. 
Of  the  fourth  turnkey  I  cannot  say  as  much.  He 
was  violent,  overbearing  and  tyrannical,  and  he 
was  frequently  guilty  of  conduct  towards  the  pris 
oners  which  made  him  very  unfit  to  serve  under 
such  a  marshal,  and  ought  to  have  caused  his 
speedy  removal.  But,  unfortunately,  the  marshal 
was  under  some  political  obligations  to  him,  which 
made  the  turning  him  out  not  so  easy  a  matter. 
This  person  seemed  to  have  inherited  all  the  feel 
ings  of  hatred  and  dislike  which  the  late  marshal 
had  entertained  towards  me,  and  he  did  his  best  to 
annoy  me  in  a  variety  of  ways,  though,  of  course, 
his  power  was  limited  by  his  subordinate  position. 
10 


110  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

But,  although  I  gained  considerably  by  the  new 
order  of  things,  I  soon  found  that  it  had  also  some 
annoying  consequences.  Under  the  old  marshal, 
either  to  make  the  imprisonment  more  disagreeable  to 
me,  or  from  fear  lest  I  should  corrupt  the  other  prison 
ers,  I  had  been  kept  in  a  sort  of  solitary  confinement, 
no  other  prisoners  being  placed  in  the  same  pas 
sage.  This  system  was  now  altered  ;  and,  although 
my  privacy  was  always  so  far  respected  that  I  was 
allowed  a  cell  by  myself,  I  often  found  myself  with 
fellow-prisoners  in  the  same  passage  from  whose 
society  it  was  impossible  for  me  to  derive  either  edi 
fication  or  pleasure.  I  suffered  a  good  deal  from  this 
cause ;  but  at  length  succeeded  in  obtaining  a  reme 
dy,  or,  at  least,  a  partial  one.  I  was  allowed,  during 
the  day-time,  the  range  of  the  debtors'  apartments, 
a  suite  of  spacious,  airy  and  comfortable  rooms,  in 
which  there  were  seldom  more  than  one  or  two  ten 
ants.  I  pleaded  hard  to  be  removed  to  these  apart 
ments  altogether, —  to  be  allowed  to  sleep  there,  as 
well  as  to  pass  the  days  there.  As  it  was  merely  for 
the  non-payment  of  a  sum  of  money  that  I  was  held, 
I  thought  I  had  a  right  to  be  treated  as  a  debtor. 
But  those  apartments  were  so  insecure,  that  the 
keepers  did  not  care  to  trust  me  there  during  the  night. 

By  this  change  of  quarters  my  condition  was  a 
good  deal  improved.  I  not  only  had  ample  conve 
niences  for  reading,  but  I  improved  the  opportunity 
to  learn  to  write,  having  only  been  able  to  sign  my 
name  when  I  was  committed  to  the  prison. 

But  a  jail,  after  all,  is  a  jail ;  and  I  longed  and 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  Ill 

sighed  to  obtain  my  liberty,  and  to  enjoy  again  the 
society  of  my  wife  and  children.  Had  it  been 
wished  to  impress  my  mind  in  the  strongest  man 
ner  with  the  horrors  of  slavery,  no  better  method 
could  have  been  devised  than  this  imprisonment 
in  the  Washington  jail.  I  felt  personally  what 
it  was  to  be  restrained  of  my  liberty ;  and,  as 
many  of  the  prisoners  were  runaway  slaves,  or 
slaves  committed  at  the  request  of  their  masters,  I 
saw  a  good  deal  of  what  slaves  are  exposed  to.  Of 
this  I  shall  here  give  but  a  single  instance.  Wal 
lace,  the  marshal,  as  I  have  already  mentioned,  had 
two  female  slaves,  the  last  remnants  of  the  large 
slave-property  which  he  had  inherited  from  his 
father.  One  of  these  was  a  young  and  very  comely 
mulatto  girl,  whom  Wallace  had  made  his  house 
keeper,  and  whom  he  sought  to  make  also  his 
concubine.  But,  as  the  girl  already  had  a  child  by 
a  young  white  man,  to  whom  she  was  attached,  she 
steadily  repelled  all  his  advances.  Not  succeeding 
by  persuasion,  this  scion  of  the  aristocracy  of  the 
Old  Dominion  —  this  Virginian  gentleman,  and  mar 
shal  of  the  United  States  for  the  District  of  Colum 
bia  —  shut  the  girl  up  in  the  jail  of  the  District,  in 
hopes  of  thus  breaking  her  to  his  will ;  and,  as  she 
proved  obstinate,  he  finally  sold  her.  He  then 
turned  his  eyes  on  the  other  woman, —  his  property, 
—  Jemima,  our  cook,  already  the  mother  of  three 
children.  But  she  set  him  at  open  defiance.  As  she 
wished  to  be  sold,  he  had  lost  the  greatest  means  of 
controlling  her ;  and  as  she  openly  threatenedj  before 


112  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

all  the  keepers,  to  tear  every  rag  of  clothing  off  his 
body  if  he  dared  lay  his  hand  upon  her,  he  did  not 
venture  to  brave  her  fury. 

In  most  of  the  states,  if  not  in  all  of  them,  cer 
tainly  in  all  the  free  states,  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
keeping  a  man  in  prison  for  life  merely  for  the  non 
payment  of  a  fine  which  he  has  no  means  to  pay. 
The  same  spirit  of  humanity  which  has  abolished 
the  imprisonment  of  poor  debtors  at  the  caprice  of 
their  creditors  has  provided  means  for  discharging, 
after  a  short  imprisonment,  persons  held  in  prison 
for  fines  which  they  have  no  means  of  paying.  In 
deed,  what  can  be  more  unequal  or  unjust  than  to 
hold  a  poor  man  a  prisoner  for  life  for  an  offence 
which  a  rich  man  is  allowed  to  expiate  by  a  small 
part  of  his  superfluous  wealth  ?  But  this  is  one, 
among  many  other  barbarisms,  which  the  existence 
of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  by  preventing 
any  systematic  revision  of  the  laws,  has  entailed 
upon  the  capital  of  our  model  democracy.  There 
was,  as  I  have  stated,  no  means  by  which  Sayres 
and  myself  could  be  discharged  from  prison  except 
by  paying  our  fines  (which  was  totally  out  of  the 
question),  or  by  obtaining  a  presidential  pardon, 
which,  for  a  long  time,  seemed  equally  hopeless. 
There  was,  indeed,  a  peculiarity  about  our  case, 
such  as  might  afford  a  plausible  excuse  for  not 
extending  to  us  any  relief.  Under  the  law  of  1796, 
the  sums  imposed  upon  us  as  fines  were  to  go  one 
half  to  the  owners  of  the  slaves,  and  the  other  half  to 
the  District ;  and  it  was  alleged,  that  although  the 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  113 

President  might  remit  the  latter  half,  he  could  not  the 
other. 

That  same  Mr.  RadcHff  whom  I  have  already  had 
occasion  to  mention  volunteered  his  services  —  for 
a  consideration  —  to  get  over  this  difficulty.  In  con 
sequence  of  a  handsome  fee  which  he  received,  he 
undertook  to  obtain  the  consent  of  the  owners  of  the 
slaves  to  our  discharge.  But,  having  pocketed  the 
money,  he  made,  so  far  as  I  could  find,  very  little 
progress  in  the  business,  not  having  secured  above 
five  or  six  signers.  In  answer  to  my  repeated  appli 
cations,  he  at  length  proposed  that  my  wife  and 
youngest  daughter  should  come  on  to  Washington  to 
do  the  business  which  he  had  undertaken,  and  for 
which  he  had  secured  a  handsome  payment  in  ad 
vance.  They  came  on  accordingly,  and,  by  personal 
application,  succeeded  in  obtaining,  in  all,  the  signa 
tures  of  twenty-one  out  of  forty-one,  the  whole  num 
ber.  The  reception  which  they  met  with  from  differ 
ent  parties  was  very  different,  showing  that  there  is 
among  slave-holders  as  much  variety  of  character  as 
among  other  people.  Some  signed  with  alacrity, 
saying  that,  as  no  slaves  had  been  lost,  I  had  been 
kept  in  jail  too  long  already.  Others  required  much 
urging.  Others  positively  refused.  Some  even 
added  insults.  Young  Francis  Dodge,  of  George 
town,  would  not  sign,  though  my  life  had  depended 
upon  it.  One  wanted  me  hung,  and  another  tarred 
and  feathered.  One  pious  church-member,  lying  on 
his  death-bed,  as  he  supposed,  was  persuaded  to 
sign ;  but  he  afterwards  drew  back,  and  nothing  could 


114  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

prevail  on  him  to  put  his  name  to  the  paper.  Die  or 
live,  he  wholly  refused.  But  the  most  curious  case 
occurred  at  Alexandria,  to  which  place  my  wife 
went  to  obtain  the  signature  of  a  pious  old  lady,  who 
had  heen  the  claimant  of  a  youngster  found  among 
the  passengers  of  the  Pearl,  and  who  had  been  sold, 
in  consequence,  for  the  southern  market.  The  old 
lady,  it  appeared,  was  still  the  owner  of  the  boy's 
mother,  who  acted  as  one  of  her  domestics,  and,  if 
she  was  willing,  the  old  lady  professed  her  readiness 
to  sign.  The  black  woman  was  accordingly  called 
in,  and  the  nature  of  my  wife's  application  stated  to 
her.  But,  with  much  positiveness  and  indignation, 
she  refused  to  give  her  consent,  declaring  that  my 
wife  could  as  well  do  without  her  husband  as  she 
could  do  without  her  boy.  So  imbruted  and  stupe 
fied  by  slavery  was  this  old  woman,  that  she  seemed 
to  think  the  selling  her  boy  away  from  her  a  per 
fectly  humane,  Christian  and  proper  act,  while  all  her 
indignation  was  turned  against  me,  who  had  merely 
afforded  the  boy  an  opportunity  of  securing  his  free 
dom  !  I  dare  say  they  had  persuaded  the  old  woman 
that  I  had  enticed  the  boy  to  run  away ;  whereas, 
as  I  have  already  stated,  I  had  never  seen  him,  nor 
any  other  of  the  passengers,  till  I  found  them  on 
board. 

As  only  twenty-one  signers  could  be  obtained,  the 
matter  stood  very  much  as  it  did  before  the  attempt 
was  made.  So  long  as  President  Fillmore  remained 
a  candidate  for  reelection  there  was  little  ground  to 
expect  from  him  a  favorable  consideration  of  my 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  115 

case.  I  therefore  felt  sincerely  thankful  to  the  Whig 
convention  when  they  passed  by  Mr.  Fillmore,  and 
gave  the  nomination  to  General  Scott.  Mr.  FilJmore 
being  thus  placed  in  a  position  which  enabled  him  to 
listen  to  the  dictates  of  reason,  justice  and  humanity, 
my  hopes,  and  those  of  my  friends,  were  greatly 
raised.  Mr.  Sumner,  the  Free  Democratic  senator 
from  Massachusetts,  had  visited  me  in  prison  shortly 
after  his  arrival  at  Washington,  and  had  evinced 
from  the  beginning  a  sincere  and  active  sympathy 
for  me.  Some  complaints  were  made  against  him  in 
some  anti-slavery  papers,  because  he  did  not  present 
to  the  senate  some  petitions  in  my  behalf,  which  had 
been  forwarded  to  his  care.  But  Mr.  Sumner  was 
of  opinion,  and  I  entirely  agreed  with  him,  that  if  the 
object  was  to  obtain  my  discharge  from  prison,  that 
object  was  to  be  accomplished,  not  by  agitating  the 
matter  in  the  senate,  but  by  private  appeals  to  the 
equity  and  the  conscience  of  the  President ;  nor  did 
he  think,  nor  I  either,  that  my  interests  ought  to  be 
sacrificed  for  the  opportunity  to  make  an  anti-slav 
ery  speech.  There  is  reason  in  everything ;  and  I 
thought,  and  he  thought  too,  that  I  had  been  made 
enough  of  a  martyr  of  already. 

The  case  having  been  brought  to  the  notice  of 
the  President,  he,  being  no  longer  a  candidate  for 
reeleption,  could  not  fail  to  recognize  the  claim  of 
Sayres  and  myself  to  a  discharge.  We  had  already 
been  kept  in  jail  upwards  of  four  years,  for  an 
offence  which  the  laws  had  intended  to  punish  by  a 
trifling  pecuniary  fine.  Nor  was  this  all.  The  ear- 


116  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

Her  part  of  our  confinement  had  been  exceedingly 
rigorous,  and  it  had  only  been  by  the  untiring 
efforts  of  our  friends,  and  at  a  great  expense  to 
them,  that  we  had  been  saved  from  falling  victims 
to  the  conspiracy,  between  the  District  Attorney  and 
Judge  Crawford,  to  send  us  to  the  penitentiary.* 
Although  my  able  and  indefatigable  counsel,  Mr. 
Mann,  whose  arduous  labors  and  efforts  in  my 
behalf  I  shall  never  forget,  and  still  less  his  friendly 
counsels  and  kind  personal  attentions,  had  received 
nothing,  except,  I  believe,  the  partial  reimbursement 
of  his  travelling  expenses,  and  although  there  was 
much  other  service  gratuitously  rendered  in  our 
cases,  yet  it  had  been  necessary  to  pay  pretty  roundly 
for  the  services  of  Mr.  Carlisle ;  and,  altogether,  the 
expenditures  which  had  been  incurred  to  shield  us 
from  the  effects  of  the  conspiracy  above  mentioned 
far  exceeded  any  amount  of  fine  which  might  have 
been  reasonably  imposed  under  the  indictments  upon 
which  we  had  been  found  guilty.  Was  not  the 
enormous  sum  which  Judge  Crawford  sentenced  us 
to  pay  a  gross  violation  of  the  provision  in  the  con 
stitution  of  the  United  States  against  excessive  fines  ? 
Any  fine  utterly  beyond  a  man's  ability  to  pay,  and 
which  operates  to  keep  him  a  prisoner  for  life,  must 
be  excessive,  or  else  that  word  has  no  meaning. 

But,  though  our  case  was  a  strong  one,  there  still 
remained  a  serious  obstacle  in  the  way,  in  the  idea 
that,  because  half  the  fines  was  to  go  to  the  owners 
of  the  slaves,  the  President  could  not  remit  that  half. 
Here  was  a  point  upon  which  Mr.  Sumner  was  able 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  117 

to  assist  us  much  more  effectually  than  hy  making 
speeches  in  the  senate.  It  was  a  point,  too,  involved 
in  a  good  deal  of  difficulty;  for  there  were  some 
English  cases  which  denied  the  power  of  pardon 
under  such  circumstances.  Mr.  Sumner  found,  how 
ever,  by  a  laborious  examination  of  the  American 
cases,  that  a  different  view  had  been  taken  in  this 
country;  and  he  drew  up  and  submitted  to  the 
President  an  elaborate  legal  opinion,  in  which  the 
right  of  the  executive  to  pardon  us  was  very  clearly 
made  out. 

This  opinion  the  President  referred  to  the  Attor 
ney  General.  A  considerable  time  elapsed  before  he 
found  leisure  to  examine  it ;  but  at  last  it  obtained 
his  sanction,  also.  Information  at  length  reached  us 
—  the  matter  having  been  pending  for  two  months  or 
more  —  that  the  President  had  signed  our  pardon.  It 
had  yet,  however,  to  pass  through  the  office  of  the 
Secretary  for  the  Interior,  and  meanwhile  we  were 
not  by  any  means  free  from  anxiety.  The  reader  will 
perhaps  recollect  that  among  the  other  things  which 
the  District  Attorney  had  held  over  our  heads  had 
been  the  threat  to  surrender  us  up  to  the  authorities  of 
Virginia,  on  a  requisition  which  it  was  alleged  they 
had  made  for  us.  The  story  of  this  requisition  had 
been  repeated  from  time  to  time,  and  a  circumstance 
now  occurred  which,  in  seeming  to  threaten  us  with 
something  of  the  sort,  served  to  revive  all  our  appre 
hensions.  Mr.  Stuart,  the  Secretary  of  the  Inte 
rior,  through  whose  office  the  pardon  was  to  pass, 
sent  word  to  the  marshal  that  such  a  pardon  had 


118  PERSONAL    MEMOIB 

been  signed,  and,  at  the  same  time,  requested  him, 
if  it  came  that  day  into  his  hands,  not  to  act  upon  it 
till  the  next.  As  this  Stuart  was  a  Virginian,  our 
apprehensions  were  naturally  excited  of  some  move 
ment  from  that  quarter.  The  pardon  arrived  about 
five  o'clock  that  afternoon ;  and  immediately  upon 
receiving  it  the  marshal  told  us  that  he  had  no 
longer  any  hold  upon  us, —  that  we  were  free  men, 
and  at  liberty  to  go  where  we  chose.  As  we  were 
preparing  to  leave  the  jail,  I  observed  that  a  gentle 
man,  a  friend  of  the  marshal,  whom  I  had  often  seen 
there,  and  who  had  always  treated  me  with  great 
courtesy,  hardly  returned  my  good-day,  and  looked 
at  me  as  black  as  a  thunder-cloud.  Afterwards, 
upon  inquiring  of  the  jailer  what  the  reason  could  be, 
I  learned  that  this  gentleman,  who  was  a  good  deal 
of  a  politician,  was  greatly  alarmed  and  disturbed 
lest  the  act  of  the  President  in  having  pardoned  us 
should  result  in  the  defeat  of  the  Whig  party  —  and, 
though  willing  enough  that  we  should  be  released, 
he  did  not  like  to  have  it  done  at  the  expense  of  his 
party,  and  his  own  hopes  of  obtaining  some  good 
office.  The  Whigs  were  defeated,  sure  enough :  but 
whether  because  we  were  pardoned  —  though  the 
idea  is  sufficiently  flattering  to  my  vanity  —  is  more 
than  I  shafl  venture  to  decide.  The  black  prisoners 
in  the  jail,  having  nothing  to  hope  or  fear  from  the 
rise  or  fall  of  parties,  yielded  freely  to  their  friendly 
feelings,  and  greeted  our  departure  with  three  cheers. 
We  left  the  jail  as  privately  as  possible,  and  pro 
ceeded  in  a  carriage  to  the  house  of  a  gentleman  of 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  119 

the  District,  where  we  were  entertained  at  sup 
per.  Our  imprisonment  had  lasted  four  years  and 
four  months,  lacking  seven  days.  We  did  not  feel 
safe,  however,  with  that  Virginia  requisition  hang 
ing  over  our  heads,  so  long  as  we  remained  in  the 
District,  or  anywhere  on  slave-holding  ground ;  and, 
by  the  liberality  of  our  friends,  a  hack  was  procured 
for  us,  to  carry  us,  that  same  night,  to  Baltimore, 
there,  the  next  morning,  to  take  the  cars  for  Phila 
delphia.  The  night  proved  one  of  the  darkest  and 
stormiest  which  it  had  ever  been  my  fate  to  encoun 
ter, —  and  I  have  seen  some  bad  weather  in  my  time. 
The  rain  fell  in  torrents,  and  the  road  was  only  now 
and  then  visible  by  the  flashes  of  the  lightning.  But 
our  trusty  driver  persevered,  and,  in  spite  of  all 
obstacles,  brought  us  to  Baltimore  by  the  early  dawn. 
Sayres  proceeded  by  the  direct  route  to  Philadelphia. 
Having  still  some  apprehensions  of  pursuit  and  a 
requisition,  I  took  the  route  by  Harrisburg.  Great 
was  the  satisfaction  which  I  felt  as  the  cars  crossed 
the  line  from  Maryland  into  Pennsylvania.  It  was 
like  escaping  out  of  Algiers  into  a  free  and  Christian 
country. 

I  shall  leave  it  to  the  reader  to  imagine  the  meet 
ing  between  myself  and  my  family.  They  had 
received  notice  of  my  coming,  and  were  all  waiting 
to  receive  me.  If  a  man  wishes  to  realize  the  agony 
which  our  American  slave-trade  inflicts  in  the  separ 
ation  of  families,  let  him  personally  feel  that  separa 
tion,  as  I  did ;  let  him  pass  four  years  in  the  Wash 
ington  jail. 


120  PERSONAL    MEMOIR 

When  committed  to  the  prison,  I  was  by  no  means 
well.  I  had  been  a  good  deal  out  of  health,  as  ap 
peared  from  the  evidence  on  the  trial,  for  two  or  three 
years  before.  Close  confinement,  or,  indeed,  confine 
ment  of  any  sort,  does  not  agree  with  persons  of  my 
temperament ;  and  I  came  out  of  the  prison  a  good 
deal  older,  and  much  more  of  an  invalid,  than  when 
I  entered  it. 

The  reader,  perhaps,  will  inquire  what  good  was 
gained  by  all  these  sufferings  of  myself  and  my  fam 
ily  —  what  satisfaction  I  can  have,  as  it  did  not  suc 
ceed,  in  looking  back  to  an  enterprise  attended  with 
so  much  risk,  and  which  involved  me  in  so  long  and 
tedious  an  imprisonment? 

The  satisfaction  that  I  have  is  this  :  What  I  did, 
and  what  I  attempted  to  do,  was  my  protest, — a  pro 
test  which  resounded  from  one  end  of  the  Union  to 
the  other,  and  which,  I  hope,  by  the  dissemination 
of  this,  my  narrative,  to  renew  and  repeat  it,  —  it  was 
my  protest  against  the  infamous  and  atrocious  doc 
trine  that  there  can  be  any  such  thing  as  property 
in  man !  We  can  only  do  according  to  our  power, 
and  the  capacity,  gifts  and  talents,  that  we  have. 
Others,  more  fortunate  than  I,  may  record  their  pro 
test  against  this  wicked  doctrine  more  safely  and 
comfortably  for  themselves  than  I  did.  They  may 
embody  it  in  burning  words  and  eloquent  speeches  ; 
they  may  write  it  out  in  books ;  they  may  preach 
it  in  sermons.  I  could  not  do  that.  I  have  as  many 
thoughts  as  another,  but,  for  want  of  education,  1 
lack  the  power  to  express  them  in  speech  or  writing. 


OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON.  121 

I  have  not  been  able  to  put  even  this  short  narrative 
on  paper  without  obtaining  the  assistance  of  a  friend. 
I  could  not  talk,  I  could  not  write ;  but  I  could  act. 
The  humblest,  the  most  uneducated  man  can  do 
that.  I  did  act ;  and,  by  my  actions,  I  protested  that 
I  did  not  believe  that  there  was,  or  could  be,  any 
such  thing  as  a  right  of  property  in  human  beings. 

Nobody  in  this  country  will  admit,  for  a  moment, 
that  there  can  be  any  such  thing  as  property  in  a  white 
man.  The  institution  of  slavery  could  not  last  for  a 
day,  if  the  slaves  were  all  white.  But  I  do  not  see  that 
because  their  complexions  are  different  they  are  any 
the  less  men  on  that  account.  The  doctrine  I  hold 
to,  and  which  I  desired  to  preach  in  a  practical  way, 
is  the  doctrine  of  Jefferson  and  Madison,  that  there 
cannot  be  property  in  man,  —  no,  not  even  in 
black  men.  And  the  rage  exerted  against  me  on 
the  part  of  the  slave-holders  grew  entirely  out  of  my 
preaching  that  doctrine.  Actions,  as  everybody 
knows,  speak  louder  than  words.  By  virtue  of  my 
actions  proclaiming  my  opinion  on  that  subject,  I 
became  at  once,  powerless  as  I  otherwise  was,  ele 
vated,  in  the  minds  of  the  slave-holders,  to  the  same 
high  level  with  Mr.  Giddings  and  Mr.  Hale,  who 
they  could  not  help  believing  must  have  been  my 
secret  confederates. 

If  I  had  believed,  as  the  slave-holders  do,  that 
men  can  be  owned ;  if  I  had  really  attempted,  as 
they  falsely  and  meanly  charged  me  with  doing,  to 
steal ;  had  I  actually  sought  to  appropriate  men  as 
property  to  my  own  use ;  had  that  been  all,  does  any- 
11 


122  PERSONAL    MEMOIR    OF    DANIEL    DRAYTON. 

body  imagine  that  I  should  ever  have  been  pursued 
with  such  persevering  enmity  and  personal  viru 
lence  ?  Do  they  get  up  a  debate  in  Congress,  and  a 
riot  in  the  city  of  Washington,  every  time  a  theft  is 
committed  or  attempted  in  the  District?  It  was 
purely  because  I  was  not  a  thief;  because,  in 
helping  men,  women  and  children,  claimed  as 
chattels,  to  escape,  1  bore  my  testimony  against 
robbing  human  beings  of  their  liberty ;  this  was 
the  very  thing  that  excited  the  slave-holders 
against  me,  just  as  a  strong  anti-slavery  speech 
excites  them  against  Mr.  Hale,  or  Mr.  Giddings,  or 
Mr.  Mann,  or  Mr.  Sumner.  Those  gentlemen  have 
words  at  command;  they  can  speak,  and  can  do 
good  service  by  doing  so.  As  for  me,  it  was  impos 
sible  that  I  should  ever  be  able  to  make  myself  heard 
in  Congress,  or  by  the  nation  at  largo,  except  in  the 
way  of  action.  The  opportunity  occurring,  I  did 
not  hesitate  to  improve  it ;  nor  have  I  ever  yet  seen 
occasion  to  regret  having  done  so. 


/  0,5,3 


